


A Hydeous Life

by suchadearie



Series: Hydeous [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, and Belle is a werewolf, and Monster pets, and Mr. Gold is Dr. Jekyll, and they have kids, hyde!verse, the one where Rumplestiltskin is Mr. Hyde
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-20
Updated: 2014-03-30
Packaged: 2018-01-16 09:19:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 33,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1341796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suchadearie/pseuds/suchadearie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a compilation of ficlets/prompts/one shots taking place in the hyde!verse after the end of "Hydeous", previously published on my tumblr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sweet Surprise

**Author's Note:**

> I'm putting these quick fics together here so they're easier to keep track of, and because I'm planning to do some longer installments to continue the story.

Belle had only a few seconds after opening her eyes to realize that she needed a bucket. Fast. Jekyll lay in bed, entangled with the sheets, and did hardly stir when she jumped out of bed and hurried for the chamber pot. Her stomach was empty, and she only managed to throw up some bile, but afterwards, she felt better. If she had needed another sign, this would be it. She was pregnant. Groaning, she buried her face in her hands. Jekyll had been sure this wouldn’t happen. With all their monstrosity going on, he was certain that conceiving was out of the question. Well, had she got news for him, then. 

Her groaning didn’t perturb his sleep, and after cleaning her face and taking a few small sips of water - gulping desperately to keep them down - she climbed into bed again and poked his ribcage. He had every reason to be exhausted, after their rather long and debaucherous night, but she decided that now was as good a time as any to tell him. When he only groaned and didn’t wake up, she poked him again.

"Henry!"

He pulled his sheets over his face, and Belle wanted to slap him. She poked him again.

"Please tell me you need me to kiss you, or else I won’t wake up." His voice was muffled by the sheets, and his arm over his face, but at least he was awake now.

"Henry! I’m pregnant." Her voice was shaking, and she was about to vomit again.

"No, you’re not. That’s impossible." He didn’t draw his arm away from his face, but Belle could tell that he sounded rather alarmed now. Of course, Jekyll would expect every child of the two of them to be some kind of monstrosity. Half wolf, half yellow imp. She could only imagine a little princess. Or a prince.

"Henry Jekyll, if you’re telling me that I don’t know when I’m past my time, and that I don’t know morning sickness when I just puked into your pisspot, then you totally deserve it when I’m going to bite off your head during childbirth."

Now he tossed the sheets away and stared at her, his eyes as big as Mrs. Lucas’ christmas cookies. “You’re pregnant?” he asked, almost panicky.

"Yes, I am."

"Uh…" And with that, the change rippled over him, and she faced Hyde.

"Well, if that isn’t convenient." Belle thrust her hands into the air and sank back on her heels. Hyde grinned, feral and hungry. Usually she would have greeted him with a similar amount of hunger, but right now, every notion of touch made her retch.

"Everything alright, sweetheart? You look green."

"That’s because I’m pregnant." She was actually curious how he would take the news. It was hard to say with his skin tone, but she thought to see him pale a shade or two.

"With a baby?" he asked, and his voice was as high pitched as the whistle of a tea kettle.

"No, with an elephant. Of course with a baby."

"And who’s the father?"

Now that was just silly, and Belle threw a cushion at him. “How would I know? It’s not as if there is a wide range of posibilities! It’s either you or you!”

"Me?" he asked, and Belle groaned and threw herself face down onto the mattress. She should have kept it from him until she gave birth. She was almost certain that he wouldn’t have noticed.


	2. Proposal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I had to squeeze this in...

Something about Jekyll was odd, but Belle didn’t know at once what it was. They lay in bed, holding each other, and his hand rested on her belly, now a little curvier than a few weeks before, when she had told him about the baby.

"What is it?" she asked, quietly, because she feared he would dissmiss her question if she was too pushy. He pulled her a little closer, and pressed a kiss into her hair.

"Belle, I want you to marry me. You can’t have my child and still be my mistress."

Her sharp intake of breath startled him, and he looked as if she had changed into an elephant before his very eyes when she bolted upright.

"I never was your mistress."

"I know, I’m sorry…it’s just…I don’t have a better word for it. Please, I want you to be my wife."

Belle closed her eyes, and tried to breathe, calm and consistently. It didn’t help. Her anger persisted.

"Henry Jekyll, you’re the stupidest man I ever met, and if I marry you, then it’s not because I love you more than any sane woman should ever love a man as stupid as you, but because I want to keep your conscience from eating you alive, because your child is illegitimate."

He was dumbfounded, and Belle slipped out of bed. “Now, if you please, I want to talk to Hyde. I have to tell my other true love that I am to be married, and soon will live in sin whenever I meet him.”

"Belle…" Jekyll reached out to her, but Belle turned her back to him. She remained like that, until she felt rough palms on her shoulders, and his breath condensed on the skin of her neck.

"What’s wrong, love?" Hyde asked, and Belle turned around and threw herself into his arms.

"Jekyll wants me to marry him", she sobbed, and Edward patted her back and crooned softly into her curls.

"Let me guess, the poor idiot screwed it up."

Belle made a strange noise somewhere between sobbing and laughing at the back of her throat, and nodded. Hyde tilted her chin up and forced her to look at him, and his feral grin warmed her from inside.

"Well, love, let him marry you. You get two for one, and he can’t get away then. You’ll own his sorry ass."

Belle giggled, and pressed a kiss to Edward’s throat. Yes, she would get two for one, and if Jekyll messed it up, she had always Hyde to comfort her. It wasn’t that bad of a deal.


	3. Giving Birth

It was a simple and modest ceremony, appropriate for a man who was suspected of gruesome murders not so long ago. A man who married a woman so thoroughly ruined that he should be ashamed of marrying her at all. But as far as Belle could tell, Jekyll was not ashamed. As with Hyde, she was pretty sure he didn’t even know what shame was. She didn’t remember much of the ceremony, since it was more an act of reassurance for Jekyll, for his reputation, less something she really needed. Besides, she was still suffering from morning sickness throughout the day, and she didn’t exactly wish to remember the moment when she puked into the baptismal font during their vows. She supposed Jekyll didn’t want to either. Her ongoing morning sickness was also the reason they stayed in town, instead of spending their honeymoon on Henry’s country estate. Belle was glad she didn’t have to travel in a swaying coach, but she missed the fresh air. As it was, she spent most of her time in the library, reading, huddled up on a couch and wrapped into a knitted blanket. She hated pregnancy. She hated being sick all the time, vomiting all over the place (she never went anywhere without her bucket), she hated that her sense of smell, already heightened because of the wolf thing, now was somehow attached to the nerves in her stomach. Every smell made her puke, and the household was suffering from withdrawal, since she couldn’t bear the smell of freshly brewed tea, or milk, or eggs. Nothing provoked vomiting like the smell of cooked eggs did. Later on in her pregnancy, her back began to hurt, and it became more and more difficult to move at all.

“The baby is blocking her nerves, especially the sciatica. That’s why it hurts so badly.” The explanation her midwife gave Jekyll didn’t do anything to help, other than giving them the knowledge that it was perfectly normal for some expectant mothers to feel this much pain. It didn’t mean that the delivery had to be the same as the pregnancy.

Sadly, in Belle’s case, the delivery was even worse than the pregnancy itself. At first the midwife didn’t want to let Jekyll near her, babbled something about how highly inappropriate this was – as if Belle ever cared – but when it looked as if Belle wouldn’t come out alive, she finally allowed Jekyll to rush at her side. And while she screamed and cursed and tried not to press, to prevent her body from ripping apart, when all her body wanted to do was to press, Jekyll held her hand, and it was the only thing she registered. She didn’t see his face, didn’t hear his voice, or his mumbled promises of never again do something as horrible to her, never again touch her, never again even so much as look at her if that was what she wanted. She cursed him, cursed Hyde, cursed every living male, while she knelt on the bed and Henry held her. She didn’t see his pleading eyes, the looks with which he begged the midwife to do something. There was nothing to do.

“Her cervix isn’t wide enough, she needs to hold back. Let her scream, that takes the pressure from down there.”

Belle couldn’t remember later how much time passed until she finally was allowed to press, didn’t remember how many contractions it took for her child to finally be born. She remembered the grief and regret weighing her down when they laid the little thing down in her arms, a dark and wrinkled little worm, and they told her it was a girl. She cried then, because she knew that one day, her perfect little angel would have to endure the same fate that she had endured, would have to live through the same pain, would have to put her life on the line to give birth, and she felt incredibly sorry for having bestowed that fate on her daughter. It was only a short moment, between the first glimpse she had of her daughter, and the brief moment of panic before the afterbirth slipped out, but it was this she remembered over everything else. Later Henry told her about his tears of joy, told her about his struggle to keep Hyde from jumping at the midwife’s throat, but it all didn’t touch Belle, didn’t reach into her soul. There was only room for her daughter, the little thing in her arms that she wouldn’t let go of, the warm little body snuggling in her arms, an angelic smile flitting over her face from time to time, the pure wonder of being alive, and the fierce hunger for more life when she put Annie to her breast for the first time. It was a shock to feel the strong suckling, feel how it flooded her body with a sensation she had not expected. It intensified the after pains, but it filled her with pleasure, too. Her breasts ached, full with milk, with the need to nurse, and the sweet pain of feeding her daughter was almost orgasmic.

She felt Jekyll’s eyes on her, but her world was so much smaller now, shrunken to a cosmos of her daughter and her, and right now, there was neither a place for Jekyll nor one for Hyde in it. She had no strength left to comfort him, to tell him that it was alright, tell him that she forgave him for putting her through this.

He had to be the strong one for now.


	4. Little One

“Are you sure about it?” Belle asked for the fifteenth time. Jekyll had stopped answering after the seventh time and had only eyes for their daughter.

“I can’t believe how perfect she is”, he hummed, and Belle rolled her eyes. Being a father had seriously affected his brain, and it was almost impossible for her to get a hold of her baby. And all of a sudden, Jekyll seemed to be an expert in child care. Which wouldn’t be so bad, if he didn’t tell her half of the time that she was holding “their little sweetling” wrongly or didn’t wrap her diapers the right way. And my, if he tried to educate her one more time about the healthy color range of the content of said diapers, she would slap him. With said diapers.

“Henry”, she said again, and this time her tone registered with him. “I need to know if you’re going to be alright. I’ll be gone for three days. There’s no room for insecurities.”

“Sweetheart, there’s no need to be so anxious. It’s safer this way. You run, and I watch our sweetling.”

“Yes, but what about Edward?” As overly cautious as Jekyll was, Hyde couldn’t be more careless. The first time he had held their daughter, he had extended the newborn towards her, his face scrunched up, and told her that there was something wrong with it, because it reeked. He was not indifferent, but taking care of a helpless little thing was not in his range of pursuits.

“I will keep Hyde away from my daughter.”

And then there was that. Jekyll had no intention of sharing fatherhood with his other half. As if their whole relationship wasn’t already complicated enough. Belle didn’t want to leave Jekyll alone, not with their daughter only four weeks old, but after giving birth, the wolftime had come back. She hadn’t changed during pregnancy, but now she felt it in her bones, felt the wolf tugging and gnawing at her insides. She couldn’t stay with her newborn. She was too afraid of what she might do.

“I’d like to talk to him, though. He will do as I say.”

Jekyll raised his brows, and pressed Annie’s feet to his lips, making ridiculous snorting sounds. “I think you trust him too much. He’s still a monster. He shouldn’t be let near our daughter.”

Somehow, this hurt much more than Belle had anticipated. “Does this mean I shouldn’t come near our Baby either?” She tried to sound calm. Tried to keep the trembling out of her voice. She failed. Jekyll flashed her an incredulous look, as if she had lost her mind, and he was so startled that he wasn’t on his guard. And in the blink of an eye, Hyde took over.

Belle tensed, her mother instincts telling her to fetch her daughter from his lap and take her as far away as possible, but she forced herself to stand still and watch him adjust. His eyes fell onto the baby on his lap, and a smile flitted across his face. Then he looked up, and saw her, and the smile left his face as if it had never existed.

“What did he do to you?” His gaze was intense, completely focused on her, but his hands still cradled the baby on his lap. Annie gurgled, and Belle took a step towards her.

“He did nothing. It was just a thoughtless remark about monsters…”

“Something about monsters not being fit to be parents?” Even if they were not really on the best of terms, Hyde knew his counterpart.

“Something like that, yes.”

“I don’t think he wanted to imply that you’re unfit to be a mother.”

This was new. Hyde had never defended Jekyll in anything before. More like the opposite. Belle stepped to him and got down on her knees to kiss her daughter.

“It’s nearly wolftime. I have to leave. Do you think you’ll be able to behave yourself when I’m gone?”

“Are you afraid I’ll eat our little one? You should know me better than that. Trust me more than that.”

Belle looked up, locked eyes with him, and relief washed over her. He would protect their daughter with his life, if he had to.

“Just one thing…who is going to change the wrapping?” He wrinkled his nose, and Belle smiled.

“Ask Jekyll. He loves to do it. And ask him about the color.” She got to her feet and turned to go.

“Which color?” Hyde peeped, but Belle only smirked.

“You’ll find out soon enough, dearie!”


	5. Empty Crib

He knew everything about newborns. After all, this was not the first time that he was a father. Although he had not seen that much from his first son, he was a doctor. It was his profession to know everything about humans, at every stage and every age. And Annie was such a perfect little thing. So Jekyll was quite confident that he would manage while Belle was away. Of course he worried about Belle, too. It was the first wolftime she spent without him. The first time she was all alone. But she was strong, and he was confident. Confident that Belle would manage, and confident that he would, too.

The first serious doubts crept in when he came back into the bedroom after kissing Belle goodbye, and the crib was empty. Well, to be honest, doubts was putting it mildly. He had a very real panic attack.

“What the…”

“You lost the baby. Belle is going to kill you.” Hyde’s sneering voice at the back of his mind made him aware that he had to get himself together. If he wasn’t careful, that yellow bastard would take over, and he didn’t care half as much for little Annie as Jekyll.

“No newborn of four weeks just up and disappears. There has to be an explanation.” It gave Jekyll a feeling of reassurance to speak to himself. At least he hoped it would do so. But he jumped and almost fell over the crib when a screeching sound broke the silence of the bedroom.

“Hopper!”, he roared, but his butler needed an eternity to follow his call. Until then, the ruckus that had its origin under the bed had grown into an actual apocalypse. There had to be at least a bear under that bed, and this bear probably had kidnapped Annie out of her crib. Jekyll got to his knees and poked with his cane into the dark under the bed, and something hissed and gnarled when he touched it with the tip of his cane. When his butler opened the door, a ball of fur shot out from under the bed and through the door.

“It looks like Sissy encountered a ghost, Sir.” Hopper sounded slightly amused while he looked after the cat, but Jekyll bent down to peek under the bed and find out what had really scared Belle’s scrawny pet.

“Close the door, Hopper. We might have a problem here.”

There was no bear. Under the bed, with its tiny white fangs bared in a snarl and the fur in its neck bristling, cowered a wolf pup. Annie.


	6. Menagerie

Hopper kicked open the door to the kitchen and groaned. The damned goat had climbed onto the kitchen table, and if the scrap of fabric hanging from a corner of her jaws was any indication, she had eaten one of the half curtains that was missing from the window right now.

“You terrible, terrible beast!”

The goat seemed totally unimpressed, and Hopper contemplated if it wasn’t better to let her stand on the table to milk her. It was certainly better for his back if he didn’t have to stoop so hard. But when he placed a bowl on the table below her udder, the goat bleated and hopped down to the floor, kicking the bowl across the kitchen in the process. Whose idea had it been to keep the stinking goat in the kitchen, anyway?

The kitchen door opened again, and one of the maids slipped in, and screeched when the goat slipped out. Fucking perfect.

“Hold the beast!”, he shouted, but it was already too late. At least Jekyll wouldn’t see the goat wandering his entrance hall and gnawing away the tapestries, since Hopper had convinced him to go to the park with Annie.

“But I can’t take her to the park. She’s not a real puppy.” There had been real despair in his voice, and for once in his life, Hopper wished he would work in a totally normal household, maybe for an old hag that ate cookies and drank tea like a sinkhole, but not this hell of a house where every imaginable monster could pop up out of a whim.

“Well, of course you can stay inside and cover the floor with newspaper. Or let her pee directly on your Persian rugs. Whatever you choose.” Hopper was very proficient with his voice. He had the most nonchalant voice if he wanted to. And most of the times, Jekyll appreciated his suggestions. But right now, Jekyll was not amused. Not at all.

“That’s my daughter you’re talking about. Not some scrawny stray.”

“Yes, Sir. Take your daughter to the park, and I make sure to milk that goat.” He might have made that promise a bit rushed, given the goat’s skills at escaping, but at least Jekyll had agreed to take the wolf outside. After all, this was a respected townhouse, not a menagerie.

At last, with the help of a strong footman and two maids, he managed to catch the goat in the library, where she had eaten a thin, leather bound tome of poetry – not that it made her bleating any more elaborate, but maybe her droppings would smell more of flowers and less of shite – and had even managed to milk that spiteful beast, when Jekyll came back, even more desperate than before. The wolf pup in his arms was squirming and twisting and yelped as if his father was trying to strangle it. The worst though were the feathers all over its fur. And every now and then, Annie sneezed and produced even more feathers. Hopper raised his brows, but he didn’t ask. He didn’t even want to know, he was sure of that.

Jekyll squirmed almost as much as the feathery wolf in his grip, and he actually blushed. This was new. Hopper had never before seen his employer so obviously ashamed.

“She…the dove…it was an accident…” Jekyll sounded as if he was about to cry. Now Hopper noticed the blood, an angry red stain on the former white shirt of his employer.

“An accident?” he asked, and Jekyll’s face turned to an even darker red.

“That dove had no business in the park. There are a lot of dogs around. They should know that. They shouldn’t go near the pups.” He stretched out the kicking ball of fur in his hands towards Hopper. “I think she needs to be disinfected, and her teeth need to be brushed before she gets her milk. And it would probably be wise to pump out her stomach.”

Hopper stared at the little wolf, its yellow grey fur covered in feathers and blood, and backed away. “I think that’s exactly the right task for a father. Maybe you should let Hyde do that…”

Jekyll held his daughter still outstretched in his hands, and the look on his face was pleading. But Hopper decided that he had had enough beastly struggles for one day. Should the yellow imp take care of his breed. And as soon as Miss Belle was back, Hopper would ask for a raise. Because goats and wolfs and yellow imps were more than a man with his wage could stomach at one day.


	7. Coming Home

Belle was exhausted, and all she wanted to do was drag herself into a bed and sleep, preferably for a week. Or a month. She hadn’t remembered wolftime being so tiring. Maybe it was because it was so shortly after giving birth. She had missed Annie, and Jekyll, and yes, Hyde, too. She longed for them.

When she slipped into the bedroom, she found Hyde in their bed. Cuddled to his chest, tiny in his arms, slept Annie. Deep lines were etched into Edward’s face, and Belle longed to kiss him, trace those lines and kiss them away. He looked so peaceful. Belle decided to just watch her little family for a while, and she tried not to stir them up when she laid down beside them. It was soothing to listen to their breathing, and watch thin rays of light flit over them as the morning sun filtered through the curtains.

She had no idea how long she was lying there, watching them, when Edward opened his eyes, slowly, like a cat coming out of sleep. He smiled, looking at Annie, and then his eyes met hers, and his smile became even wider.

“You’re back”, he said, quietly, to keep Annie from waking up. Her daughter slept like a stone.

“She’s such an angel.” Belle played with a lock of Annie’s hair, as fine as spider webs, and she almost missed it when Edward raised his brows. “Did you have any problems? Did she refuse the goat’s milk?”

“She would have eaten the goat if we let her near that damned creature. Hopper would have shot me.”

Belle frowned. Her daughter was barely four weeks old. She didn’t go anywhere on her own. But with that thought came the realization that she had not expected to find Hyde in her bed when she came home. Jekyll was too afraid of his other half.

“What happened to Henry?” she asked, and held her breath when a dirty grin erupted on Edward’s face.

“He gave up after two days and several casualties.”

“What does that mean?”

“A dove, two rats and a ferret. Wonder where that came from.”

Belle just stared at him. “We had rats in the nursery?”

“No. The rats were in the backyard. As was the ferret.”

“But…” She trailed off, hoping for an explanation.

“Annie is quite the killer.” Hyde looked down at his daughter, and his smile was filled with so much pride that it took Belle a moment to realize what he just said. Then her breath hitched in her throat, and made a sound that startled her baby awake. Belle stared into her daughter’s grey eyes, and wondered if the golden specks in them had been there before.

“She changed?”

“She did. Precious little pup we have there. Although the goat would disagree. As would the dove. And the rats. But at least we don’t have to worry about the pests anymore.”

“Right…” Belle tickled her daughter beneath her chin, and her heart opened at the angelic smile that flitted over the little face. That was until she noticed the two pearly white fangs in the former toothless gums of her little girl. And she wondered how she was supposed to feed Annie now.

“Ah, yes, dear. You have to be careful now. She bites.” And Hyde snickered, before he bent over to kiss Belle.


	8. It's all the tooth fairy's fault

Belle knew that there was nothing that could be done about it. Her daughter changed into a wolf. She had never expected it to happen when Annie was still a baby, though.

“Granny told me I started turning when I was fourteen”, Ruby had told her, tickling Annie to make her laugh and get a glimpse of the tiny fangs. How was she supposed to explain a newborn with fangs? Normal babies started teething when they were six or seven months old, early ones with four months, but four weeks? And the teeth in her daughters mouth were unmistakably fangs. No sweet baby teeth. No, they were sharp and pointy, and they didn’t retreat when wolftime was over.She looked like a little tooth fairy. A rather terrifying tooth fairy.

“It’s probably my fault”, Jekyll said when they were alone again, and Belle almost hated him for claiming this as his fault. Of course, everything had to be his fault, result of his curse. Because the world evolved around Henry Jekyll.

“That’s nonsense. I’m the wolf. Not you. So she clearly inherited from me.”

“Darling, I didn’t want to upset you. I just…I want you to know that this is not your doing. You did nothing wrong.” He came to her, and lifted her chin with his fingertips. She didn’t want to look at him, but he waited patiently until she finally met his eyes.

“I know I did nothing wrong. But you didn’t either. And there is nothing wrong with Annie. She’s perfect.” She was just different.

“All I wanted to say is that her turning this early might have to do with me and Hyde. She’s a yellow wolf pup, you know?” Still he was touching her jaw, and his touch prickled on her skin.

“So you’re saying it’s Hyde’s fault?” She knew she was unreasonable, but her shock was still too fresh to listen to reason. Or Jekyll. So she was misunderstanding him on purpose. She didn’t even know that she was crying until he wiped over her cheek and she saw the wetness glistening on his thumb.

“Of course not, no. Hyde may be my fault, but Annie is a miracle. I never thought we would have a child. And I cherish her – and you – above all else. We will find a way to make this work. We always find a way, my darling.”

Belle tilted her head to snuggle her cheek against his palm, and she kissed his still wet thumb. “You’re right. And this was probably the doing of a nasty little tooth fairy that was jealous of Annie’s perfect teeth.”

He chuckled, and bent down to kiss her, and Belle knew, as long as he – and Hyde – were at her side, her little family was safe. Even from tooth fairies.


	9. Life isn't Lemon Cake

Hopper had no idea when he had had a full night of sleep for the last time…and he suspected that the lack of sleep only worsened his memory-problems. Wasn’t it the wet nurse or the parents that were supposed to stay awake at night and look after the little one? True, the thing with the wet nurse hadn’t really worked out – the first wolftime of baby Annie had shown clearly that she was a babe with special needs, and a squeamish wet nurse from town wouldn’t do. What they needed was more in the direction of someone adept in the use of an crossbow. And Miss Belle had insisted on feeding her newborn herself, something almost scandalous in the better circles, but then, there wasn’t much in this household that wasn’t scandalous, and hadn’t been even before Miss Belle. It would have been really difficult to explain to a wet nurse who this Mr. Hyde was, and why he was just as much a father to Annie as Dr. Jekyll was.

Though Hopper preferred Dr. Jekyll at any time of the day, he came to tolerate Hyde’s presence better since Miss Belle somehow put him under a spell and reigned in his terrible temper. Miss Belle herself seemed as sweet as lemon cake, at least most of the time. She could be a little short tempered when wolftime approached. Well, and wolftime itself revealed that she could be a lemon cake with a quite rotten core. And then there was the memory of her violent cursing echoing through the house while giving birth that still haunted his dreams. He had not expected to see Jekyll or Hyde alive after that.

Well, the feeding of little Annie had become more difficult after the first wolftime, and after being bitten a few times, Miss Belle had given up. Not easily, no. Jekyll and Hyde and even Hopper had to coax her into defeat, appealing to her reason (or, in Hyde’s case, something else, but Hopper refused to think about that, since it made him shudder). Hopper’s part had been to show her that Annie could just as well live on goat’s milk, and since the goat was already there (leaving her droppings all over the backyard and the kitchen, thank you very much, and always chewing away the laundry that the maids put up to dry), Miss Belle had finally given in.

And after a few months, they had developed some kind of routine. Most of the time, Miss Belle or one of the fathers – depending which one was around at the time – took care of the feeding, but it was always Hopper’s job to prepare the meal – speak, milk the goat, that seemed to have some perverse crush on him, since he was the only one who could get his hands on that damned beast – so he had to get up at any time of night and day when little Annie was hungry. And that child was perpetually hungry. So hungry that Hopper feared for the life of his goat each month around wolftime.

Apart from that, Hopper felt quite comfortable managing his household, and he liked to imagine that they would be truly lost without him. And he long since stopped to question the strange requests his employers posed at times. Miss Belle had that kind of smile that let one forget any discomfort one might have felt if someone else asked for chains or iron rings to be installed at the heavy wooden frame of their marital bed. And not even Annie’s sharp fangs, and her habit of gnawing at the wooden furniture once she was agile enough to crawl around, could make her any less adorable. She only had to let out one of that giggles that sounded as if it came right out of a magical fairy circle to have the entire household at her feet.

Yes, Hopper was quite comfortable. Even if he sometimes wondered a little how a Mr. Hyde had managed to get his filthy fingers on someone as perfect as Miss Belle, when the only romance in his own life consisted of milking a disturbingly smitten goat. And that infatuation was quite one-sided, thank you very much.


	10. Withdrawal

Belle was not sure what it was, but the first wolftime after giving birth had changed something. She was hungry again – ravenously hungry – and it was not food she craved. Not that she had starved during pregnancy, but the last four weeks of it had been exhausting, and giving birth had felt like being ripped apart. So she needed some time to recuperate, and she had been shocked when wolftime came back just four weeks after Annie’s delivery. But it wasn’t as painful or bad as she had anticipated, and after the change, when she came home, a new need burnt inside her. Sadly, Jekyll was not so sure if it was healthy to resume those activities again so soon, and Hyde…well, after he had rested, Jekyll took over again, and she didn’t see enough of Hyde to get engaged in those kind of activities. And then there was the privacy issue. Belle herself wouldn’t have minded if they did it in the study, or the salon, or wherever, but Jekyll was a little more worried about his decency, and she feared she would have to chain him to a wall – or a bed – to get what she wanted. And every time she thought she had him finally cornered, someone – or something – interrupted them.

The first time, it was one of the maids. “Miss Belle, Hopper sends me to…” The girl trailed off, clearly shocked as to what she just walked in on, and Belle got to her feet to block Jekyll and his half dressed state from her view. Behind her back, Henry choked and made a sound so mortified that she almost pitied him. He had no reason to act as if he was caught naked, since her skirts were wide enough to block him from the maid’s shocked gaze. Belle wiped her sleeve over her lips and smiled at the maid, but the girl turned around and fled as if she had witnessed a satanic ritual.

“And there goes another one”, Belle growled, before turning around. Jekyll had already pulled his pants back up. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Um…Finding out what Hopper wants?”

“Henry Jekyll, I think you need to reassess your priorities.” That made him drop his pants again, but before Belle could resume what she had done before they had been interrupted, the door banged open again and Hopper stormed in, not even trying to act like a proper butler.

“Miss Belle, it’s inexcusable of you to scare away the maids. Verna just quit, and she’s the fourth maid in three weeks. How am I supposed to keep this house in order without the maids?”

“Hopper.” Jekyll growled from behind Belle’s back, but Hopper seemed not to notice him.

“Do I have to clean myself? Do I have to scrub the ovens, and the floors, and do the laundry and the cooking and milk that beast to feed Annie?”

“Hopper!” Jekyll was a little louder now, but Hopper still ignored him.

“It’s hard enough to humor them when Mr. Hyde is around. Is it so hard to keep up at least a little decency?”

“Hopper!” When Jekyll roared his name for the third time, the butler paled and snapped his mouth shut. “Is there a problem?”

Hopper swallowed, and Belle shuddered with pleasure at the menace that vibrated in Jekyll’s voice. “Yes, Sir. There is a minor thing, nothing serious, but I think Sissy scratched Annie, and now she’s crying and it’s impossible to calm her down and…”

Jekyll didn’t listen anymore. He had pulled up his pants again and was out of the door in a heartbeat, pale and cursing and clearly panicked. Belle sighed.

“How did Sissy scratch Annie?” she asked Hopper, and the butler looked as if he had to bite into rotten fruit when he answered.

“I think Annie grabbed her tail and pulled…”

“She’s only six weeks old. She doesn’t grab.”

“Not on purpose, I think. But Sissy slept in the crib, and you know how babies sometimes get a hold of something and don’t let go…”

Belle sighed again. “Yes, I know.” She wanted to follow Jekyll, prevent him from completely losing his composure – after all, Annie was a wolf, and she probably healed just as fast as Belle did, so she wasn’t really worried about a scratch – but then she had an idea.

“Hopper…do you think you could get me a carpenter? I’d like to install some chains in the bedroom.” She smiled her most innocent smile, and Hopper reigned in his face almost at once.

“Chains, Miss Belle?”

“Yes. You know, Jekyll and Hyde have developed a habit of escaping me. I’d like to fix that.”

“Of course.” He swallowed, and avoided her gaze. “I’ll ensure that it’s done as soon as possible.”

“Wonderful. What would I do without you?” And with that, she followed Jekyll. When she reached the nursery, he was carrying Annie around, humming softly and cradling her, but his face betrayed his fear. Understandable, given the violent crying her daughter emanated. He didn’t want to hand her the baby, but after a while he gave in, and as soon as Belle cradled Annie to her chest, her daughter ceased crying and gurgled contently.

“It’s ok, Henry. Nothing happened.” She felt the need to comfort him when he sank down on a chair, as white as a sheet and shaking. Belle sighed again.

“The cat has to go”, he said, after examining the scratch on Annie’s arm.

“No. You gave me Sissy. She’s just as much family as Annie. So she stays.” Jekyll wanted to argue, but Belle’s mind was set. The cat had to stay. In the end, Jekyll gave in, but he made her promise that Sissy had to stay out of the nursery. After that, he was a little anxious and it was almost impossible to separate him from his daughter. Romance had to wait again.

The next time Belle managed to corner him, pulling him into a dark corner and pressing her lips to his in feverish passion, he was just starting to respond, to kiss her back, when they were attacked by that damned goat. Hopper followed close behind his beast, but this time he had the decency to avert his eyes and ignore them. The goat, however, was not so considerate, and she was particularly interested in Belle’s skirts. It took Hopper and a footman – and cost Belle a perfectly fine dress – to stop her from eating Belle’s underskirts while she was still wearing them.

“Why is this beast even in the house?” By now even Jekyll sounded desperate, and Belle would have thrown something at Hopper and his nonchalant face, if she would have gotten her hands on a vase or something. When the chaos was cleared away, she was determined not to let Jekyll slip away again. So, as soon as Hopper and his goat were out of the hall, she grabbed his hand and pulled him with her and into his study. And this time, she locked the door. No more interruptions.

“What are you doing?” he asked, but his hoarse voice told her that he knew exactly what she was doing.

“I’m getting you to sleep with me again.”

“But sweetheart, it’s so soon…Are you sure about this?”

She could see his anticipation, but also his doubts. “Don’t make me bring out Hyde, Henry. Either you get undressed now, or you won’t see me naked for the next three months.”

That tipped the scale in her favor, and he turned around and cleared the surface of his desk, sending books and paper fluttering to the floor, before he pulled her close and lifted her up, so she came to sit on the desk.

“As you wish, my darling.” He started to open the buttons at the front of her dress, and pulled up her skirts, and every touch of his fingertips sent shivers over her skin and made her breath hitch in her throat. He pulled up her knees and wrapped her legs around his waist, and when he caressed the backside of her thighs, she moaned and arched her back. God, how she needed this. How she had missed this. And god, how many layers of fabric there still were between her and him.

“Darling, do you want a new dress?” He pressed kisses to her throat and her collarbones, and wriggled his hands into her dress.

“What?”

The next moment, the ripping sound of fabric answered her question. Her corset resisted a little more than her dress, but Jekyll didn’t let it stop him. He pushed her down and, with a feral grin, fished for the paper knife on his desk. “Hold very still, my dear”, he said, before sliding the sharp blade under the laces and cutting her free. Belle didn’t dare to breathe until he tossed the knife over his shoulder.

“That was very…hydeous of you.” Her voice was thin, breathless, but it was excitement that made her tremble. He bent down and licked over her breast, sucked in her nipple, and she made a very ungainly sound. He ripped through her drawers, and his hungry passion alone made her wet and ready, but this was never enough for Jekyll. He wanted her as slick as he could get her, so she wasn’t surprised – and she certainly didn’t protest – when he got down on his knees between her legs and started to kiss the inside of her thighs, sucking in skin, licking and planting tiny bites there, making his way to her sex. She grabbed his hair, pulling him closer, and his breath wafted over her when he chuckled, making her tremble in anticipation.

“Oh Lord, please, kiss me already!” She groaned it out, and rolled her hips to give him better access.

“Only kissing, sweetheart? You mean like this?” He pressed his lips to her sex, and she moaned. She wanted so much more, now, and he wanted to draw it out.

“I’m not in the mood to play, Henry. I want you, now, before anything else happens in this household that keeps us apart for another fortnight.” She squeaked when he licked over her and sucked that point between his lips that made her world swirl, and then protested when he let go of her and grabbed the edge of his desk to pull himself up again.

“Just another moment, sweetheart”, he said, fumbling with his pants. Belle let out a cry when he finally entered her, and answered each of his thrusts with a rolling of her hips. “God, Belle, you’re so wet. You have no idea how much I missed this…”

Belle wasn’t able to answer him. She wasn’t even up to coherent thinking, much less to talking. Each of his hard thrusts brought her closer, filled the emptiness she had felt lately, and her climax came almost simultaneous with his last deep thrust. He sank down onto her, and Belle closed her arms around him, raked through his hair, pressing kisses onto his forehead and the crown of his head.

“I love you”, he whispered, raising himself onto his elbows. He looked at her as if he couldn’t believe she was there.

“And I love you. All of you.” She smiled, happy, sated, and at peace with the world. And she didn’t even care when there was a knock at the door and Hopper gave a little cough before announcing that they had a visitor.


	11. The Chains

Belle waited until Henry was asleep. It took him long enough, and two times he jerked back awake because Annie made a sound. But when he finally slept, nothing could wake him up again, not even the soft clinking of the chains, or the clicking sound when the shackles closed around his wrists. Belle had instructed Hopper to make sure that the chains were installed at the headpiece, where they could be covered with the curtains and were hidden from view. Poor Henry had no idea. She hoped that the sturdy iron rings that held the chains were strong enough to hold Hyde as well, but she would find out soon enough.

After pulling the chains tighter – something that made Henry moan softly in his sleep and pulled up his arms over his head – she looked down on him, and couldn’t keep away the joy at finally having him where she wanted him – completely at her mercy. It had taken long enough, and he was as slippery as an eel when it came to having alone-time. Besides, she thought, he had chained her up once when she was unconscious, so she was just making good on that. Of course, he had done it to prevent her from going on a killing spree. She did it with him just to savor him from head to toe. Him or Hyde. She slid out of bed to light some candles and close the door to the nursery. Annie would sleep, and if not, there was always a maid or Hopper nearby. After locking the doors and lighting the candles, she slipped out of her nightgown. Henry stirred, and the chains clinked again. When he groaned in his sleep, Belle made up her mind. She would start with him, and later, she would have Edward. She slipped back into bed, under the covers she shared with him, and started to stroke his ribcage, let her palms glide up and down his body above his nightshirt.

It was when he started to react to her touches and wanted to put his arm around her that he slowly came out of sleep and realized that he couldn’t move his arms.

“What the…” He pulled at the chains, and Belle clasped his wrists beneath the shackles to keep him from moving too much.

“Shhh. Henry, dear, I shackled you.”

“You…what? Why?”

Belle sat up at his side, and let the blanket drop to let him see that she was stark naked. “What do you think? You’ve been running long enough now.”

His gaze dropped from her face to her chest, and he swallowed. He bit his lip, and Belle saw desire awaken in his eyes. At least that was unchanged. Under his gaze, her nipples hardened, and she pressed her thighs together. Her own arousal was mounting fast, and his eyes on her alone made her feel warm. She had missed this, and that one time in his study had not been enough to sate her. She bent down, grabbing his nightshirt, and ripping it apart. He gasped, and his hips bucked. Now Belle had to swallow, her mouth watering at the sight of his cock already hard and ready, standing to attention.

“You like that, don’t you?” she asked, caressing his chest, and his belly, and bending down again to kiss him, claim him, mark him. He groaned into her mouth, lifting his head to hold the connection as long as possible when she drew back again. “Tell me”, she said, hoarse, her voice raw with desire.

“Yes, darling. I like that…Please…” His hips bucked again, begging for her to touch him _there_ , but she had other plans. She straddled him, rubbing her entrance, already wet and starving for friction, to his cock, kissing him again. But she denied him to enter her, and he panted helpless little _pleases_ into her mouth, buckled beneath her, pulling at the chains that bound his arms over his head. She sucked in his lower lip, and let go again with a plopping sound.

“Belle, please…”

She kissed her way down his throat, down his chest, licking and biting, and grazing her teeth over his skin. She knew he liked that, knew she could drive him into a helpless state of need, and that was exactly how she wanted him. Belle slid down his body, and the closer her lips came to his cock, the more frantic his begging became. Oh, she knew how he loved this, and she loved how much he loved it.

“Please what?” she asked, after kissing his hips. She closed her hand around his shaft and gave him a few light strokes, and he groaned deep in his throat.

“Please Belle, please…kiss me.”

She smiled, and pressed her lips to the tip of his cock. “You mean like that?”

He nearly choked, and thrust upwards into thin air. “Please, I want to…I want to feel your tongue!”

Ah, this was difficult for him, and Belle enjoyed his struggle, enjoyed to see him fight for what he wanted. It made her proud, made her love him all the more. She licked up and down his length, relishing his smooth skin. “Like this?” she purred, and he almost sobbed.

“More…please. Your mouth…” She knew that he wouldn’t get any more coherent then this, so she closed her lips around his cock and sucked, pressing her tongue against him. A long groan escaped him, and he thrust upwards again, trying to get deeper into her mouth. She took him in deeper, and pulled back again, and each time she did it, his body shook more violently, his groans grew longer, deeper in his throat. Belle tasted the first salty droplets of his seed, and she lapped over his tip, her tongue soft and gentle, until he squirmed beneath her. She noticed how he tensed, how he held his breath and gritted his teeth to hold back his climax.

“Belle, sweetheart, please, stop…I’m close…” He loved to feel her lips around his cock, but he always was deeply ashamed when he came into her mouth. It was the shame, and the fear of losing control, that made him squirm and beg now, when she took him in again, as deep as she could without choking. She slid her palms over his belly, felt his abs tense, and he arched his back and moaned like a ghost in a drafty castle when his climax claimed him. Belle swallowed his seed that filled her mouth, warm and salty, sucking off every last drop of it. He was hers, and she wanted all of him. When she lifted her head, searching his eyes, he squeezed them shut, shivering.

“When will you learn that I love you?” Belle asked, and he drew a shuddering breath.

“I will never stop wondering.” It was only a whisper, and Belle’s heart clenched in her chest. She crawled upwards, cuddling to his side, and let her fingertips wander over his chest. “Will you unfasten me now?” he asked, and she giggled.

“No. I’m not finished with you. I love you, all of you. Let him out.”

He tensed, and Belle had to cup his cheek to make him look at her. “I want Hyde, Henry. Give me Edward.”

This was the greatest proof of his love to her. When he closed his eyes, shuddering, and allowed his other self to surface, she knew that he really loved her. Because he was not only willing to share her with something – someone – he despised, but also because he allowed himself to become what he feared the most. For her. How could she not love him?

“Darling, you look as if you just lost someone.” If it wasn’t for the sneer in his voice, Belle might have believed that Hyde really felt compassion. But she knew him better than that.

“I have you now.” She smiled as he rattled at the chains, and smiled even wider when they held.

“Impressive, dearie. What are you going to do to me?”

Belle bent down and claimed his lips, kissed him until she had to break apart to breathe. “Now I’ll take you”, she said against his lips, and he answered with a snarl, arching his back. His cock stood already to attention – and this was what she treasured about him; he didn’t need time to recuperate after spilling himself as Jekyll. Hyde didn’t conform to the same limitation as ordinary humans did, and neither did she. But before she would straddle him to ride him until her world was no longer stable, she spread her legs to kneel down beside his upper arms, bringing her vulva to his lips. And he started lapping at her core in blissful abandon. Belle had to grab the headpiece of the bed to hold balance, and her head fell back with the sensations washing over her. Hyde loved to do this, and oh, he was good at it. He found all the right places. She was already close when he stopped, turning his face and gently biting the inside of her thigh.

“Darling, I want to be inside you. Unchain me.” There was no _please_ in his voice, and her insides clenched with the sudden rush of heat and want. She did as he said, opened the shackles with the little key that hung on a hook on the bedpost. And as soon as the shackles fell off, freeing him, he seized her, throwing her on her back. He towered over her with his broad grin, and all her breath left Belle. Just as she had claimed him before, he now claimed her, and he was neither gentle nor hesitant about it. He entered her with one deep and hard thrust, one that shook Belle from inside out. But oh, how she loved it. This was how she wanted to be taken by him. Just as she took what she wanted, reckless, taking all he had to give. Their love for each other was not always gentle. It was a wuthering fire, burning passion, and each of his thrusts told her that she was his. That he was hers. Later, their love would be docile again, would live in gentle touches and time spent breathing skin on skin, cherishing the moment and the stillness and the nearness of each other. Now, they were raging beasts, ravenous in their hunger, and Belle claimed him with teeth and claws, until she came undone in his arms, drowning in raining stars.

He didn’t stop then, but turned her on her stomach and pulled her up to her knees to enter her from behind, and Belle screamed her second orgasm in the pillows as he spilled himself deep inside her, groaning her name with a cracking voice.

Their breath was ragged, panting, and it took both of them some time, lying in each other’s arms, to regain the ability to form words. Hyde was a little faster than Belle, and his eerie giggle tickled over her skin when he turned his face towards her.

“You know, sweetheart…I’ll get back at you about those chains. And it will not be pleasant.”

Belle chuckled and snuggled closer. “I know it will, my love. You’re not capable of unpleasantness.”

“I think that’s only a rumor, love.” He pressed a kiss into her hair, and Belle was sure that the smile on her lips would not leave her, not even in her sleep.

“I know the truth about you”, she whispered, before slipping into dreamless sleep.


	12. The Chains Pt. II

Of course Hyde would get back at her. She had known it even before she chained him up. Hyde loved his plays, and he didn’t forgive being beaten in his game. Knowing this was part of the exciting rush racing through Belle, and she anticipated his revenge with her blood boiling and her thighs trembling.

“You know what’s coming, don’t you?” he asked her the following night, and Belle bit her lips and smiled.

“First you have to get me”, she teased, knowing that it wouldn’t take him long. But from time to time, she enjoyed being his prey, enjoyed the hunt, even when it just was around the bed in their bedroom. She slipped through his grasp twice before his hands closed around her waist and he hurled her down on the mattress. Belle managed to wrap her legs around him, roll on top of him, but just as fast he had her pinned down again.

“Now I have you, sweetheart. What are you going to do now?”

“Surrender?” She panted, breathless from the rush, from him being close. He bent down, pressing his nose to her neck, and his teeth found her earlobe. He nibbled along the shell of her ear, making her squirm and giggle.

“Already? I hoped for a little more fight. I hoped I had to chain you up.” There was real disappointment in his voice, and Belle twisted beneath him, turned her head and buried her teeth in his shoulder, drawing a sharp intake of breath from him.

“That’s more like it, my little minx!” He grabbed a fistful of her hair and pulled her head back, exposing her throat to his lips and teeth. It was just as much a bite as a kiss, and Belle moaned with the trickle of heat spreading from his mouth on her, with the ache building in her lower belly, with the painful, prickling emptiness all over her skin. She wanted him to touch her, everywhere, to reach right into her and soothe the needle-sharp desire that lingered under her skin. But instead, he took her wrists, pinned them over her head and fiddled with the shackles. Belle arched her back, pressed her chest against him, almost purring when he closed she shackles around her wrists.

“Are you afraid of me, Edward?” she asked, playful, and fluttering her lashes at him. He giggled, this high pitched sound that she always connected with the first time they had met, and it sent a prickle between her legs. He had been pure menace then.

“Of course I am. You’re a dangerous little thing.”

She laughed, but it ended in a gasp when he bent down and licked over her lips before capturing them in a kiss. He sucked in her bottom lip, nibbled it, and pushed his tongue into her mouth as she opened up for him. Belle would be happy if they just went on like this, kissing and nibbling and biting and licking, but Hyde took his lips away from her, denied her his skin and his mouth, and made her whine with the loss and the emptiness. He pushed himself farther down her body, and Belle could do nothing, couldn’t hold on to him. The chains rattled as she pulled at them, and the iron rings dug deep into her skin.

“Shhh, sweetheart, I don’t want you to hurt yourself. Keep still.” Hyde pressed a kiss between her breasts, pulled at her nightshirt with his teeth, and Belle growled, growled like the hungry wolf she was.

“Are you mad at me when I rip apart another one?” he asked, chuckling, and Belle shook her head, unable to form words. He sat up, straddling her hips, and grabbing her gown at the collar.

“Jekyll will buy you new nightgowns, I’m sure.” With that, he tore apart the thin fabric, and Belle’s breath caught in her throat when his eyes roamed her body. There was so much adoration there. Hunger. Hyde let go of the fabric and traced her ribcage with his palms, firm, with just enough pressure to make her feel her breath pushing against his hands. He stroked down her waist, and bent down again, kissing her collarbones, and farther down, letting his lips wander to the tip of her breast. He was always a little rougher than Jekyll, more forceful, but today, his lips hardly touched her, left her starving.

“Please, Edward…” He always wanted her to beg, needed it, as if he was not sure she really wanted him, but today, it didn’t have the desired effect.

“Shh, Belle, sweetheart, I want to relish this.” He slipped to her side, stretched himself out, pressed flush against her, trailing his fingertips like wisps of smoke over her skin. “I want to touch every bit of you as long as you can’t run away. Don’t you allow me that much?”

“You can always have that…”

“Yes, but now I want to make you tremble and squirm in need, and I want to deny you your release.”

“What?”

He chuckled, pressing his lips to her throat, and started to kiss his way down to her chest, to her nipples. When he sucked the first one in, she remembered for a brief moment the sweet sensation of nursing Annie, and allowed herself a short moment of grief over the loss of that. She had nursed Annie only for a month and a half, and she still mourned it. Her milk had dried up shortly after she stopped nursing, but now, when Hyde lapped at her nipples, she wished he would taste her, wished there were still droplets of her milk spilling, like during the first days after she stopped feeding Annie.

Hyde kissed his way down to her stomach, and Belle sucked in air when he nibbled at her hip. She was terribly ticklish there, and it was almost painful when he licked from her hip down to the nest of curls between her legs. He knew this, knew how she reacted with involuntary jerking to every touch of her lower belly, and mostly he took care to touch her firmly there, not to tickle her, but today, he seemed bound to make her suffer.

“Edward…” She gasped, and her hips jerked up when he licked over that sensitive spot again.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“Harder, please…more pressure…”

He giggled and sucked in skin beneath her navel, making her squirm. “Here?” he asked, after letting go of her skin, and she groaned in frustration.

“Deeper!” She spread her legs, and he rolled between them, placing her thighs on his shoulders. But he didn’t kiss her right away, instead breathing softly over her, blowing down on her. She couldn’t even grab his head to push him down on her, and the chains clinked when she pulled at them.

“Here?” he asked again, and his tongue flicked through her folds, parting them for his kiss.

“Yes, please!”

His chuckle wafted over her, and then he ripped a moan from her lips when he started to lap at her core, slow, soft, like a cat cleaning a kitten, and he found all the right places. He started a glowing fire down there, kindled the heat that melted her flesh and drew desperate whimpers from her throat. Belle bit her lips, wanted to hold back the noises she made, but Edward turned his head and bit the inside of her thigh.

“I want to hear your pleasure, darling. Moan for me, cry for me, whine. I want to hear you mew.” He returned his lips to her folds then, kissing, licking, sucking, until she was almost there, almost bursting, like Chinese fireworks, could almost touch the sky, the stars, so close…He left her, and she collapsed, sobbing and pleading, but Hyde didn’t comply, denied her what she wanted. He pushed himself up, covered her with his body like a blanket, almost smothering her with his weight, and kissed her, making her taste herself, drink her juices from his lips, and he swallowed her groan when he entered her.

“God, Edward, please…” She didn’t know what she was begging for, but she wanted to reach the stars, wanted the lights and the blackness, wanted to go back to almost there. Feeling him inside her, filling her, was nice, but it left her craving for more. Hyde grinned, and pulled one of her legs up, placing it over his shoulder, burying himself even deeper inside her. She gasped when he pounded into her, when their bones met with the force of him thrusting into her, but still it left her wanting for more. Only when he bent down, making her bend her leg almost up to her ear, and placed his mouth on her throat, open, wet, hot, started to suck the tender spot there, did her world come undone, shatter into tiny sparks and lightning bugs.

Hyde wasn’t finished with her, but he gave her a moment to come down again, to breathe, before he pulled out of her, kissing and biting her neck.

“You know, sweetheart, it’s very practical that you fastened the shackles in one spot. This way I can turn you around…” He stroked down the insides of her arms, down her sides, before clasping her waist and flipping her around, as if she didn’t weigh anything. He was strong, but still, Belle felt like a doll, completely spent and unable to move on her own. He pulled her up to her knees, and she rested her head on her forearms, propped up on her elbows. He liked to have her this way, liked it when she couldn’t look at him, and Belle was sure that it was partly because he still couldn’t believe that his appearance did not bother her. She did not mind it. In fact, this way it was far easier for him to reach all her sensitive spots while thrusting into her. And he knew how to do that, knew how to tickle her the right way. Belle screamed her second climax into the mattress as he came undone deep inside her.

They lay side by side for a while, panting, and Belle was close to drift off to sleep.

“Unchain me?” she asked after a while, an eerie echo of the first time Jekyll had chained her to the wall down in his dungeon. Hyde raised himself up to his elbows and grinned down at her.

“But why, darling, the night is nowhere near finished!”

Belle sighed, and smiled. If she wanted, she could tear the bed to shreds, could turn in a heartbeat and slip out of those shackles…but right now, it felt good to give up control for a while and let him do whatever it was he wanted to do. Tomorrow, it would be his turn again. His turn to trust her, and his turn to wear the chains.


	13. An ordinary Evening

Jekyll had been sure that he had screwed his chances of ever again being a father. Had been sure he lost every right to be a father when he lost his son. So the revelation that he would indeed be a father again, have another child, with Belle, left him amazed. Stunned. Speechless. And even when he held his perfect little girl in his arms, he couldn’t believe that this was real. And as long as it had taken him to acknowledge his love for Belle, it only took him the length of a heartbeat to know that his love for this little human being was eternal, and unquestionable, and as big as the sun and the stars and the endless night of the universe. Nothing could change that, least of all Annie’s little…affliction. Though it made things a little complicated.

But he learned to handle it quickly. Well, he had to. He suspected that, even though being a baby, Annie could infect others with her lycanthropy through biting or scratching, and Annie enjoyed it more than anything to let her jaws snap shut around something, preferably living. So, for wolftime, he handed out thick leather gloves among his servants and ordered everyone to wear thick, padded clothes. And after the disaster with the dove, he went only out with her at night. He had no inclination to live through the social awkwardness of apologizing for his daughter’s – well, his puppy’s, for outsiders and passers-by – blood thirst. At least Annie made no compromises, so London would be spared from were-doves, -rats, -ferrets and –ducks. He himself was thankfully immune. It had its perks to be a monster.

But Annie was more than a little wild when it was wolftime, and other than a dog, she was utterly immune to any kind of training. So, after the third wolftime in town (and more casualties than he wanted to admit), he came up with a plan.

“I think we should leave town for wolftime, and spend the days on my country estate in Scotland.”

Belle smiled at him over her book and nodded. “That’s a good idea. The only thing Annie could eat there are sheep…and they’re still a little big for her, don’t you think?”

“Yes, yes, absolutely”, Jekyll said, thinking of the swan his little girl had killed last wolftime. Of course he hadn’t told Belle about that. Swans were pretty big, and scary, and he still had difficulties to fathom how exactly his hardly four months old daughter could have possibly killed that beast.

She looked like any ordinary baby when she was in her human form, apart from the fangs, of course. He pressed his nose to Annie’s cheek to smell that delicious Baby scent, and swayed a little on his feet. He was carrying her for quite a while now, since she seemed to sleep better when he cradled her to sleep. Annie yawned, and hiccupped, before snuggling her head back to the crook of his arm. Jekyll was very aware of Belle’s eyes following him full of love and pride on his rounds through the room. He hummed softly when he wanted to lay Annie into her crib, and he had to free his shirt out of her fangs. She always sucked in his shirt, and her sharp little teeth got caught up in the fabric. He watched her curl up under the blanket, and not until he was sure that Annie was fast asleep did he tiptoe back to Belle to get a kiss of a different kind.


	14. The Monster under the Bed

Belle needed a moment to fight her way out of the dark realms of sleep. She recognized Henry’s form beside her in bed, heard his deep and steady breathing. Something had awoken her, but it took her another moment to find out what it was. Then she heard it again. Annie was calling them.

“Papa!”

Belle considered to ignore her daughter only a little longer. Maybe she would go back to sleep.

“Papa!” Annie called three more times until Belle decided to wake Henry. After all, his daughter was calling him. She shook his shoulder, and he rolled groaning onto his back.

“Your daughter needs you”, she told him, and he groaned again. He looked a little as if he was sleepwalking when he rolled out of bed and dragged himself to the adjacent room, where Annie’s bed stood. It took him a while to fumble with the lamp. When the golden light of the lamp fell through the door, Belle heard Annie whine.

“I want Papa” her daughter peeped.

“Papa’s here, darling.”

“No Daddy, I want Papa.” Belle recognized the stubborn tone in her daughter’s voice. Henry didn’t know it yet, but he had already lost.

“Sweetie, maybe I can help you. Shall I sing you another song?”

Belle smiled. He was so breathtakingly sweet. But if Annie wanted Papa, then Papa was what she would get, in the end.

“I want Papa.”

“Why do you want Papa?”

“Because of the monster.” There was so much reason in the voice of her two year old daughter that Belle needed a moment to realize that she had no idea which monster her daughter meant. Monsters were not out of the ordinary in Annie’s life, though she usually didn’t refer to them as monsters.

“Which monster, sweetie?” Henry asked.

“The monster under the bed, of course. Papa has to scare it away.” Still Annie sounded like reason herself. Belle bit her lips to stifle the giggle. Annie was so grown up with her two years that Belle sometimes forgot that she was still a baby.

“Sweetie, there is no monster under the…holy fucking Cheesecake, what the hell is this?”

Belle leapt out of the bed and was in the nursery before Henry was finished cursing. She fetched Annie out of the bed and pressed her to her chest. Jekyll was on all fours, peeking under the bed, and he made a strange noise.

“It’s the monster, Mama. I want Papa. Daddy is afraid of monsters.”

“No, he isn’t. Where did the monster come from?”

“I don’t know.” Annie’s voice had that tone that told Belle that her daughter knew exactly what was under the bed, and knew exactly where it had come from.

“Annie.”

“It looked so lonely. I just wanted to give it a home.”

“And now you’re scared of it?” Belle caressed Annie’s cheeks and made her little girl look at her. Jekyll was still staring at the thing under the bed.

“It makes ugly noises. I don’t like ugly noises.”

As if it had heard Annie’s words, the thing under the bed let out a screeching noise that made Belle’s hairs stand on end.

“Where did you find it? And how did you bring it inside?” Out of the corner of her eyes Belle saw the change rippling over Jekyll, and she huffed relieved. Hyde was much better suited to take care of that strange thing under the bed.

“It was in the park. At the pond.” Annie played with Belle’s curls, grabbing fistfuls of her hair and twisting it around her little fists.

“Annie, I told you not to adopt every creature you come upon!” At the sound of Hyde’s high pitched voice, Annie’s face lit up, and she let go of Belle’s hair to clap her hands.

“Papa!” But the smile left her face just as soon as it had appeared. “I know, Papa”, she said, solemn and with her nose creased. “But it was lonely.”

Annie hated loneliness. She thought that everyone deserved to have a family like she had. Hyde grasped into the space under Annie’s bed and pulled out something grey and wriggly. Belle had no idea what it was, and even Hyde looked somehow flabbergasted.

“It looks a little like an overgrown tadpole”, he stated, holding the thing away from him. He was right. Its skin look slimy, and it had four stumpy legs that looked a little like not yet finished frog legs. And it had a long, wriggling tail, just as a tadpole. The only difference was that this thing was as big as a pug.

“But if this is a tadpole, how big will it be when it’s fully grown?” Belle asked, and Hyde shrugged.

“Whatever it is, it looks like it needs water to be happy. I’ll put it into the rain barrel, and next week we’ll take it with us and set it free.”

“But it needs a family”, Annie peeped. Hyde got to his feet, still holding the thing away from him – and them, thank God – and pressed a kiss to Annie’s cheek.

“I’m sure it will be just fine. It can befriend the fish in the lake when we set it free again.”

“And we will visit it every time we pass Loch Ness, yes, sweetie?” Belle kissed Annie on the other cheek, and her daughter nodded.

“I’ll call it Nessie”, she said, yawning.


	15. Hyde and Seek

Belle let the book she was reading sink into her lap when the door to the library burst open and Annie stormed in. Her daughter looked around as if searching for a way to escape. Just when Belle wanted to ask what was wrong, Annie spotted her and flew to her, sliding the last foot or so on her knees and crawling under Belle’s skirt.

“Honey, what are you doing?” Belle asked, and a giggle from somewhere out of her underskirts answered her.

“I’m hiding, of course.”

“Why are you hiding?”

“Shhh, Papa must not know I’m here…”

Belle stared at the bulge of fabric where her daughter had curled up under her skirts. But when she heard steps approaching the library, she smoothed out her dress and tried to make Annie’s hiding place less obvious. She just managed to put her book back up, pretending to read, when Hyde entered the room, on tiptoes and hopping like a fox plodding through deep, powdery snow. Belle watched him over the edge of her book, hiding her smile behind the pages.

“Belle, my sweetheart…Have you seen the little troll?” He had detected her in her corner, and a smile crept over his face, slow and full of mischief.

“I didn’t know we have trolls now.”

“It’s only a little one, but I believe it borrowed the mouse tails and the bat wings I need for the soup and vanished.”

“Did it, now?” Belle watched him as he crept closer, and his eyes lingering on her told her that he was already forgetting his mission. Beneath her skirts, Annie trembled like a humming top and giggled. “And what will you do with the troll, once you catch it?”

“I will make it eat the soup.” Glee vibrated in his voice, and Belle had to bite the insides of her cheeks to stifle the laughter. Hyde came closer, and his eyes flitted over her bulging skirts. He wriggled his brows, grinning, before taking the book out of her hands.

“I want to see your beautiful face, sweetheart”, he said, bending down to kiss her. When Belle tilted her head, he nibbled along her jaw and to her earlobe, but instead of kissing her, he whispered to her, “And I want to see what you’re hiding beneath your skirts!”

Belle blushed, not sure if he was referring to Annie or something else…Both, she decided after a brief look into his grinning face.

“There’s nothing under my skirts”, she said, and Annie giggled again.

“That’s too bad. Means I have to eat my soup alone, and without all the delicious stuff, too.” He actually managed to sound sad. Annie wriggled nervously, and Belle patted her head through her skirts.

“I’m sure you will enjoy it nevertheless.” Belle smiled and tilted her head, hoping he would kiss her again.

“Yes, but I fell in love with the troll, and now I will never see it again, and that makes me quite sad.” He sighed, and Annie, beneath Belle’s skirts, shrieked and crawled out of her hiding place. She lunged at Hyde and flung her arms around him.

“But Papa, I’m here! And I don’t have the mouse tails and bat wings…I only have your shoe laces…But please, don’t put those in the soup!”

Hyde chuckled and lifted Annie up to kiss the tip of her nose. “Well, as long as my little troll is with me, I’ll eat my soup without complaints.”

Belle watched as he carried Annie out of the library and smiled. As long as Hyde had his little troll, he would do anything. She just wished she had gotten another kiss, because she missed spending time alone with Hyde. Monstrous time. But it seemed as if the little troll had completely tamed the beast.


	16. The Other Wolf/The Other Wolf's Demise

Jekyll let the book sink down on his lap and listened. Maybe it was just the wind howling through the drafty castle, but maybe it was something else. Belle and Annie were out, running in their wolf form, and they should be safe enough. But this sound was worrying. It sounded like a whole pack of wolves…And as big and scary Belle as a wolf was, she stood no chance against a whole pack. He dropped the book and hurried out, taking two steps at once and almost falling on the stairs.

He didn’t even notice the change, too alert, to nervous, the fear gnawing at him, and Hyde didn’t need more than a few seconds to adjust to the foggy, cold outside. He was running across the grounds, to where the howling and gnarling came from, not even hesitating for the shortest moment before jumping right into the middle of the pack circling _his_ Belle and _his_ Annie, snarling and spitting, baring their yellow teeth. And it took the packleader only a few moments - and the loss of two of his pack members - to recognise that this monster wasn’t just playing around.

When he turned back, he found Belle, changed, naked, holding her daughter to her chest and shivering.

"I guess he wanted to either integrate me into his pack, or kill me…" she said, with clattering teeth, and Hyde slipped out of his shirt to cover her with it. Annie, still a wolf, squirmed and yapped in her mother’s arms.

"Well, he would have to get past me to have you. That’s a fight he wouldn’t win." Hyde helped her up, and took Annie from her, to lead them both back into the castle and to safety.

* * *

 

Belle had had nightmares that night, and woke more than once covered in sweat, or – one time – in fur that bristled at her neck, and the stuffing of her pillow between her fangs. Hyde calmed her down again, held her, rocking her back to sleep, but Belle couldn’t shake off the feeling that something was terribly amiss. Something dreadful was to come, and she felt it in her bones, felt it pulling at her nerve endings, calling her outside and into the woods. She stayed, choked down the change, pushed back the wolf.

The next morning she awoke with Jekyll at her side, and he wore a frown that mirrored her own uneasiness.

“I don’t know if this castle is the best place to spend your wolftime”, he said, and Belle had to agree.

“It seemed like a good enough idea.”

Though, when they had visited the castle for the first time, there had been no other wolves in the vicinity. Now there were, and it scared Belle. Annie was still too small to fight herself out of really dangerous situations. When she looked after her daughter, Annie was still asleep. And she was still a wolf. Belle was amazed how adept Annie was at changing at will, with her three years, but she had no control when she was asleep. She was at her most peaceful then.

Belle felt as if the sun had hardly come up – but then, the sun hardly ever came up, and it was constantly gloomy inside the castle – when they had a visitor. Belle suspected the tall, dark haired man to be a neighbor, someone who wanted to introduce himself to them, but the hostility he displayed convinced her that this was not a courtesy call. This man, who was almost twice as big as Jekyll, had a mission. And he reeked, as if he had rolled in something dead and rotting.

“I’m here for the woman”, he declared, and Belle inhaled sharply. It was the kind of bold, right out block-headedness that Jekyll despised, and that had him on edge in an instant.

“And what woman would that be?” Henry asked, and his velvety tone didn’t fool Belle. He was already sharpening blades to flay their guest if he’d make a move into the wrong direction.

The next words startled them both, and Belle couldn’t hinder the gasp coming over her lips.

“The wolf one. You took two of my pack members, I’m taking one of yours. And make no mistake, imp. This time, I came prepared.” With his last words echoed the faint click of a gun through the stone hall, and Belle stared at the weapon the other wolf was pointing at Jekyll. She could hardly breathe.

“And you think that is enough?” Jekyll was mocking the other man, and Belle wondered if he had lost his mind. “You will be able to fire one, maybe two shots at me. Then you’ll still have to face her, and I can assure you, she can get nasty. You wouldn’t be the first one I’d see her kill.”

“That’s why I brought this”, the other one said, reaching into his jacket with his free hand and pulling out a second gun, pointing it at Belle.

“I still don’t get what you could possibly want with her. It’s not as if she would stop fighting you if you take her away. And you’ll have to put away that gun at one point.”

Belle felt her spine tingle, felt red-hot rage flare at the small of her back, but she choked it down, waited for Jekyll to give her some kind of sign as to what he was planning. He had to have a plan, right?

She hoped that Annie would stay out of sight. She had been playing somewhere up on the railing leading around the hall, between the book cases, and Belle only hoped that she would stay there, still as a mouse.

“Oh, I think she’ll behave. Otherwise, Malcom up there will do something nasty to your little pup.”

Belle looked up to the railing, and what had been red-hot wrath before was now ice-cold fear. A second man – where had he come from? – was standing up there, holding Annie up with a brutal grip on the fur of her neck. And worse, he, too, was holding a gun.

“What do you want?” Belle croaked, and the black haired giant grinned, showing his nasty black teeth.

“Fresh blood, of course. We haven’t had a fresh bitch in years. We have a little problem with inbreeding, and since you’re obviously fertile…”

Jekyll snarled, and made a move, and the black haired bastard pulled the trigger and shot Henry into the leg. Belle screamed, and Annie howled, but every movement froze. Jekyll didn’t fall down, but he bent over and grasped his wounded leg – the bad one, Belle realized, as if she was in a great distance, and had all the time in the world to take in all the little details. The blood welling up, the angry red droplets spurting out of the hole above his knee, with its singed edges, Annie’s panicked yelping, and the maniacal laughter of the man holding her daughter, and shaking her, sounding like a hyena, and not like a man at all.

“You can’t have her”, Henry panted, and Belle recognized the deadly rage in his eyes, beneath the surface of his strained face. He would fight to the last, would fight and kill them all before giving her up. But Annie needed them. Annie. The other wolf didn’t want Annie.

“I’ll go with him. You look after Annie.” She would find a way to kill that bastard, and it would be a slow and painful death, and if she had to rip him limb from limb, then so be it. She just wanted Annie to be safe. Annie, and Henry.

“You heard her, imp. Seems like she wants a real man.” He grabbed her arm and pressed the gun to her skull, and Belle allowed him to drag her out of the hall. Just before she was out of the door, she saw how the other one – Malcom – tossed Annie over the railing, down into the hall, and she stopped dead and wanted to get back, wanted to catch her falling baby. She saw Jekyll leap towards the falling wolf pup, saw him change in flight, saw Hyde catching her daughter before she crashed into the ground.

The moment her daughter was safe, Belle whirled around and slammed her skull into Blackhair’s throat, kneeing him into the crotch. He toppled over, groaning. No, he had not expected that, and Belle used his moment of pain and confusion to let her rage take over. She was wolf before he was fully down on the floor, and before he had time to change, she had buried her teeth in his throat. Inbreeding, indeed. His change was slow and incomplete, and he was dead before he was fully covered in fur. But she didn’t let go until he stopped moving, until Hyde closed his arms around her from behind and dragged her away from the bastard that had intended to harm her family.

“Belle, it’s alright. The other one’s dead, too. We’re safe.”

She was snarling, and gnarling, too nervous to change back, and every hair on her body bristled. Only when Annie patted at her side, pressing her nose to her chest, Belle felt her heart slowing down, felt the ire leave her, slowly, felt the overwhelming stench of blood and wolf loosen the grip on her, and she changed back.

“Are you alright?” she asked Hyde, and he grinned as if nothing had happened. His leg was fine. Everything was fine.

“I think we’ll go hunting, my dear. It seems there is a pack of wolves on the loose.”


	17. Masquerade

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I squeezed in a new Chapter 2, 3 and 12, so this was previously Chapter 14. Sorry for the inconvenience

“Do we really have to go?” Belle asked again. She hated those social events of the ton, where everyone attended just to tattle behind fans, and derail the rest of society. She knew that Henry didn’t like it either, but other than she herself, he was able to overlook blatant stupidity and do his social duty. And as long as he kept Hyde from appearing, he was fine.

“Darling, it’s one ball. You will wear a mask and no one will know you. Besides, no one remembers.” He stepped behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders, meeting her eyes in the mirror of her dressing table. His palms were warm, his touch gentle, but it didn’t do much to reassure Belle.

“Besides”, he continued, taking her hairbrush and starting to tend to her hair, “Annie wants to go. She’s never been to a masquerade before.”

“And you know perfectly well why that is.” Belle tilted her head to give him better access, and he bent down, brushing her hair aside, and kissed her neck, just beneath her jaw.

“Yes, but she’s old enough now, we’re between full moons and she’ll wear a mask.” He kissed his way down her neck, and his hands slipped down to the neckline of her dress, where he played with the lace edging.

“When did you become the adventurous one of us two?” she asked, and he chuckled.

“When I married you, dear.”

“Hm. I’m still not sure that this is a good idea.” But her protests were cut short when Annie burst through the door, waving a mask and swirling like a carousel.

“Mama, look, isn’t that the prettiest dress of all the world? And the mask, look at the mask!”

It was impossible to resist Annie’s excitement, and Belle thought that she would be able to go through one evening of social torture, if only to make her little girl happy. And she had Henry at her side to help her get through with it. She almost succeeded. She endured long, pointless conversations, boring chit-chat about Lady Abigail’s dress or the way Thomas Westchester completely disgraced himself by staring at his wife like a mooncalf, and the very indecent neckline of said wife’s dress – “She could just as well go naked”, one of the elder matrons said, with that haughty sneer that Belle detested – but she swallowed down every remark of her own, and kept sarcasm to herself, very aware of Jekyll’s still tainted reputation. He was kind of an intellectual, and those were mostly forgiven for eccentric behavior, as long as they didn’t contort with criminals, were suspects in murder investigations, involved in shady procedures with just a tinge of sexual exploitation – as in, having shared a woman with a criminal and later even married said woman – but he had done all those things, or was at least suspected to have done them, so Belle tried very hard to be an example of demure demeanor. She was too aware that her own reputation was beyond saving. She didn’t care so much for that, was even glad to be mostly ignored. As for the whispers behind her back, she could live with those. What she couldn’t tolerate were the sneers her daughter had to endure.

The children had their own ball, wearing flittery costumes and masks, enjoying mummers and acrobats, well away from the grown-ups. And although Belle overheard one or two remarks over one particular wild little girl, she remained silent. She never intended to make a scene, not until she heard that ear-splitting screech that made everyone jump and head for the garden, where a little play had been enacted for the children’s amusement.

Belle was sure that she didn’t want to know what was happening, and the cries of horror and panic convinced her even further. Somehow, while she was dragged out into the garden with the other guests, Jekyll appeared at her side, clasping her hand. He wanted to make sure that she didn’t lose control, she knew that.

“What’s wrong?” Jekyll asked when they reached the circle of panicking artists.

“One of the children slipped into the cage with the wolves and wanted to let them loose.”

“Oh god…” Belle groaned. There was no need to ask which child it was. Belle fought her way through the crowd around the wolf-cart, closely followed by Jekyll. She felt him in her back, his presence, his heat, with senses heightened by fear.

“Breathe”, she heard him whisper, “breathe, don’t change.” He was right. She had to remain calm, or she would create an even bigger catastrophe. She reached the cart, and Annie, crouching behind the bars, her little arms wound tightly around the neck of a shaggy wolf.

“I don’t even know how she got in there…” That was one of the acrobats, and he sounded as if he was about to cry. “This will ruin me.”

“This will ruin you? That is my daughter in there. If something happens to her, you’re lucky if you survive this night!” Belle’s composure slipped away, fast, and Jekyll grabbed her arm and yanked her to his side.

“Belle, concentrate.” His order was calm, and briefly she wondered why he wasn’t panicked, why he was not fighting Hyde beneath the surface. “Look. Annie’s fine.”

He was right. Annie had her face buried in the wolf’s fur, and the beast seemed more irritated by the crowd around the cage than by the little girl clinging to his neck.

“Annie, darling, what are you doing?” Belle tried to sound as calm as Jekyll, even when she didn’t quite manage to do so.

“Mama, they’re holding the wolf captive. He’s so sad, I can’t let him be so sad. He’s lonely. He needs a family. Please, can we be his family?”

Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Jekyll roll his eyes and mouth a silent “not another one”, but all she cared about right now was Annie’s safety. When they had to adopt yet another beast, so be it.

“If we do, will you come out of that cage?”

“Yes, Mama, I will.” Annie grabbed one of the wolf’s ears, and Belle held her breath, but the wolf only nuzzled her daughter. Annie whispered something into its ear, and it almost looked as if the wolf was smiling then. Belle turned to face the acrobat.

“How much for the wolf?” she asked.

“He’s not for sale. Wolves are hard to come by. They’re extinct in Great Britain, we had to get him from Eastern Europe…”

That was when Jekyll spoke up, and his voice was clipped and cold, sending a shiver down Belle’s spine. “You will either take ten pounds for the wolf or watch me shoot it and get nothing. Your choice.”

Some of the people around them gasped, and whispered, but the showman licked his lips and contemplated only for the length of a heartbeat.

“Ten pounds sounds like a fair price”, he said.

“Then we have a deal.” Jekyll waved the man off, and Belle stepped to the cage, careful not to startle the wolf.

“Did you hear that, Annie? We’ll take the wolf with us. Now come out again, alright?” Annie pressed her face once more into the ragged fur of the poor creature. Now that she was closer, Belle could see the sorry state the wolf was in, and she understood what had made her daughter act that way. Annie crawled to the door of the cage and Belle pulled her into a tight embrace. Annie smelled of wolf, of the wild and the woods, a smell that was so much more like Annie than the milky, soapy smell other children had.

“You’re crushing me, Mama”, Annie whined, and Belle let go of her. Annie smiled, showing off her perfect little fangs, and the smile dispelled Belle’s fears from moments ago.

“It looks like Annie acquired us another pet.” Jekyll stepped to them, shielding them from the crowd. “I thought we talked about this, precious. No more monsters. One day, Hopper will quit on us, and who is to feed your menagerie then?”

“I do. And Peter is not a monster. He’s a wolf.” Annie smiled at her father, and Jekyll was just as helpless as Belle. Someday, Annie would charm a flying horse out under some prince’s arse, and the poor fellow would not even know what happened. At least Hyde would have fun then.

Belle smiled, and not even the disapproving faces of London’s upper class could dampen the pride she felt for her daughter’s bravery.


	18. Letters

Jekyll was flushed crimson, and Belle had no idea what had made that happen. She had entered the laboratory to bring him something to eat and maybe steal a kiss or two, but now she was afraid he might have had an accident with one of his mysterious potions. Maybe had inhaled something toxic.

“Henry, what’s wrong?” She rushed to his side, not caring for the food and tea on her tray as she placed it on one of his workbenches. “Come, you have to get out of here!” She grabbed his sleeve and pulled him towards the little backroom, where he sometimes slept, and where she had spent so much time after her first turning. She had made sure to exchange the chaise longue for an actual bed, and she pulled him down to sit beside her on the mattress.

“Everything’s fine”, he growled, but Belle didn’t believe him.

“But your face…Did you mix something wrongly, or spill something?”

He winced, and if possible, got even more crimson.

“Henry.”

“Belle…You never told me that he is writing you…love letters.”

“What?” Belle was at a loss. She had no idea what he was talking about, or about whom, because she had never received a single love letter. Jekyll’s face distorted, as if he wasn’t able to bear the pain any longer, as if something was ripping him apart from inside. He extended a crumpled piece of paper towards her.

“I found this in one of my trunks when I was looking for something. Tell me, did he really do all of those things to you?”

Belle smoothed out the paper and started to read, but she came no further as the first two lines before she herself flushed in her most unbecoming lobster red. It was a letter from Hyde. And oh my, it was a very detailed one. She clapped her hand to her mouth to muffle the choking sound that wanted to come out.

“Tell me, Belle.” Jekyll sounded mortified, and Belle covered his hands with hers and squeezed, tried to reassure him.

“Well, he isn’t lying…” It was the wrong thing to say, and Jekyll jumped off the bed and away from her.

“You let him do that to you?”

Belle looked back at the letter. It wasn’t that much of a revelation, she thought, and it wasn’t horrifying enough to grant such an outburst from him. Perhaps he was ashamed about the things he liked, deep down, the things only his other half dared to enact.

“Would you like to try it?” she asked, and he paled, as fast as if someone had emptied a bucket of chalk over his head.

“Try what?”

“Well, Henry, there is more than one thing pictured in this letter, and we already did all of them, but it’s a little sad that you have no idea how good it feels and how glorious it was, so maybe we should do it again?”

“I don’t think so. Some of it sounds as if it would hurt you.”

Belle bit the insides of her cheeks to keep her face as straight as possible. Poor Jekyll had no idea. She decided to let it rest. She didn’t want to pressure him. But she wouldn’t allow him jealousy. “We don’t have to do any of it. But I quite like it when you do it as Hyde. And I’m not ashamed about any of it.”

“Well, maybe I am.” His words were harsh, and Belle winced. It took him a moment to realize how hurtful his words were. Then he limped across the room and got down to his knees in front of her, much faster than he usually did, without any regards to his bad leg, and Belle felt the urgency behind it, in the way he grasped her hands and pressed them to his chest.

“Darling, I love you. And the thing that worries me most is just that I could have done such abominable things to you, subjected you to something you didn’t want, and you wouldn’t even tell me. Hyde’s a monster, and he does monstrous things. Do you want me to get rid of him?”

Belle met his gaze, his brown eyes surrounded by worried lines and wrinkles. So much anguish there.

“Henry, it’s alright. He – you – did nothing I didn’t want him to do. You don’t have to worry. And I don’t want you to get rid of him. Please. I love you. Both of you.”

He let his head sink into her lap, and Belle pulled one of her hands free to rake through his hair, stroke him gently, trying to make him believe. He never trusted himself, never believed he was a good man. Never believed to deserve her love, her forgiveness. Her fierce possessiveness of him. How easy it was to unsettle him. Her heart ached a little for him, for his insecurity, and his hatred of himself.

She would never be able to take that away from him, and that was the worst about it all.


	19. Dearest Belle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hyde's Letter to Belle

~~Light of my days.~~ My sweet Darling,

Last night I woke up, with you at my side, the moon playing in your hair and sneaking over your skin like a thief, and I still tasted you on my tongue, like salted honey. You sighed when I kissed your shoulder, and made that sweet little sound when I pinched your nipple, like the kitten does it in its sleep. I wanted to fuck you right then, wanted to have you in every possible way, wanted to plough through your wet heaven and wanted to have you lick your own juices from my prick, like I know you like it. You always smile when I come into your mouth, and you lick your lips as if you just had sweet cream and couldn’t get enough of it.

You tossed in your sleep, and pressed your back and your perfect little ass against me, and I wanted to take your ass, too, but at the same time, I just wanted to hold you as long and as tight as I could, before something could rip us apart again. I love those moments when you sleep, when you are completely mine, and I can hold you and feel you breathe. Love them just as much as I love to bend you over your dressing table and make you watch as I take you from behind. Just as much as I love to watch you touch yourself, love to hear you beg for me, for my cock in your mouth and your pussy and your ass, love to watch as you rub my spilled seed over your breasts and lick it from your fingers. And I love to let you tie me down…Remember, my sweetheart, the one time in Scotland, in the stables, when you tied me to the wooden bar and took your crop down on me until I came? And remember when I tied you to that same bar? I remember it with every smile you give me. With every kiss I remember how thorough and completely and hopelessly I belong to you. You’re mine, and I’m yours.

And remembering all that we’ve had, knowing what we’ll have, I didn’t need to wake you up. Was content just holding you ~~although my cock was quite hard from all those memories~~ and kiss your neck and wait for the morning when I could love you in the light. ~~Wait for another time to lick you until I drown in your honey~~. Wait for you to be awake, smile at me and kiss me back, my Love.

E.


	20. Dark Hallways

Jekyll was furious. Belle saw it in the way that muscle in his jaw twitched, and the way his nose grew somehow sharper, and his lips hardened. It was time to get him out of there, away from the intimate circle of gentlefolk that had gathered to bask in their own glory. Whenever it came to discussing the “better circle” of lawyers and someone mentioned her former employer Mr. Jones – who had managed to gain quite a standing – Jekyll came close to losing his composure. He still despised the man, and Belle feared the day they would actually encounter him on one of those soirées. For now, she tried to catch Jekyll’s gaze and lure him away, out of the small salon, before he could turn into Hyde in front of everyone’s eyes. She knew the signs by now, and right now, he was extremely close to turning.

She left the small group of women she was talking with without bothering to excuse herself, and she ignored the irritated looks that this behavior earned her. She had no breath to spare, since she was dancing along the edge of fainting for hours now. Hyde had played chambermaid earlier, and he liked to lace her tight, partly for his own amusement, partly, he said, so she didn’t forget him when she was out with Jekyll, and remembered him with every breath she took, with every movement, with every tweak and pinch of her corset. Bastard, she thought, as she made her way to her husband.

“Henry”, she murmured when she reached him, placing her hand on his arm to distract him from his conversation, and he sent her a glare that would have turned anyone else to ice. His partner in conversation was obviously glad to be released and vanished faster between the groups of guests than Belle could have said “Run”.

“What?” Jekyll hissed, and Belle wanted to take in a deep breath, before she remembered that there was no room for air inside her.

“Let’s get you out of here for a spell. I need a little help…”

That always did the trick, and he followed her out of the room and into a dim hallway of a side-wing of the pompous town house. But Belle saw the twitching under his skin, saw something ripple over him, and by the time they reached the corridor, he had changed, and it was Hyde that she was dragging along.

“You need to learn to control that”, she hissed, before she remembered that it was useless to tell that to Hyde. He had no interest in keeping Jekyll from turning.

“Control what, darling?” Hyde asked, high pitched and giggling, before he grabbed her shoulders and pressed her against a wall and himself against her. Every sound Belle could have made came out thin and breathless, strangled by her tight laces. She dug her nails into Hyde to keep herself upright when he pressed his lips down on hers and smothered the last bit of air out of her. Only when she pressed against his shoulders and punched him, he let go of her again.

“What’s the matter, sweetheart? Don’t fancy a kiss?”

“I can’t breathe, you bastard!”

“Tsk. Language, dear.” He chuckled, and hurled her around, pinning her to the wall with his chest pressed to her back, and lacing his fingers with hers. “Need a little help?” he whispered into her ear, and his breath sent hot shivers over the naked skin of her neck. Her dress had a plunging neckline, quite obscene compared to her usual demure high collars, and when Hyde started to nibble down the side of her neck and along her shoulders, she knew that he appreciated her dress more than she herself.

“It would be nice if you could loosen my laces a bit. Please.”

He chuckled again, deep in his throat, a dirty sound that made Belle’s knees weak – not that it needed much to accomplish that, given her constant state of breathlessness, but when he gently bit the crook of her neck, she couldn’t hold back the moan. “And please, keep it decent. We could be found any moment…They’re probably already wondering…” She trailed off when he started to yank open the buttons on the back of her dress and shoved her short, puffed sleeves down her upper arms.

“I like it when you are so civil and compliant, dear. Too bad I have to deny you to breathe sufficiently to get you like that.”

“Beast”, she hissed, and he buried a hand in her pinned-up hair and pulled her head back, towards him, until he was able to reach her jaw-line, and her lips with his teeth. Belle stilled. He was dangerous tonight, and ferocious, and his breath on her skin and his heat in her back kindled her hunger.

“Be nice, or I might lace you even tighter.” He turner her head so he could kiss her, and drink her breath from her lips.

“You would kill me to have me all obedient? That’s not a very clever plan…” She gasped when he wriggled his free hand inside her dress and started to loosen the lacing of her corset. There was a little bit of yanking and pulling involved, but after a while, she was able to breathe a lot better, and it was almost like a rush to be able to expand her ribcage and suck in air. For a moment, she was so relieved about that that she didn’t even notice that Hyde’s hand had wandered, from the lacing in her back to her skirts, and she squeaked in surprise when he started to pull her dress up, gathering her skirts around her hips, and shoved his knee between her legs.

“What are you doing?” It was another hiss, and she flinched when she heard the sound of a door closing down the corridor.

“How does it look? I’m taking advantage of your gratitude.” He pressed a hot kiss to her neck, wet and openmouthed, and Belle tried to swallow the moan he elicited.

“Edward Hyde, you will button me up again right now, or…” Whatever it was she wanted to threaten him with, it got lost when he wriggled his fingers into her drawers, between her thighs, and right to her centre.

“Or what? You’re dripping wet, darling. I wouldn’t wanna leave you like this.”

Belle gritted her teeth to keep down the sounds tickling deep in her throat. He knew exactly how to touch her, knew how to pinch and rub that point of hers, the little pearl hidden at her centre, and he used his knowledge shamelessly, making her squirm and bite the back of her hand to keep herself from making a sound.

“Don’t hurt yourself, my darling Belle. Stop biting yourself.” He licked over the shell of her ear, and Belle forgot what she wanted to retort when he pushed two deft fingers between her wet folds and inside her. Now she pressed herself to the wall to stay on her feet, and she was almost grateful for his body pressed to hers, because it kept her from falling.

“Do you want me to stop?” he asked, silkily, and knowing exactly that she was too far gone to stop now. Belle pushed her backside against him and rubbed herself on him.

“No, bastard. Don’t stop”, she rasped, and Hyde chuckled again, teasing her by pressing his fingers up inside her, to that special place that made her gasp and groan and grind her hips. Then he pulled his fingers out, and this time Belle groaned in protest, and whimpered when she heard him suck her juices from them. Between her heavy breathing, and his panting as he started to fumble with the closure of his trousers, she almost missed the sound of another closing door. It was dark in the corridor, and the company of guests was in another part of the house, but still, they were terribly exposed there in the hallway, pressed to a wall. But every thought of getting caught flew out the window when Hyde ripped her drawers apart – Great, another pair, Belle thought, and lost the thought on the spot when he kicked her legs apart and entered her from behind, grunting, shoving her up the wall until the tip of her toes in her leather boots were the only part of her still on the ground, and pulling her head back once more to kiss her. He swallowed her desperate moans as he moved inside her, slow at first, finding the best angle, and Belle buried one hand in his curly hair to pull him closer, and pushed herself away from the wall with the other. Her whispered moans grew into panting, a gasping staccato of sighs, when he increased his tempo, thrusting into her faster and harder, and wriggling his hand around her, through layers and layers of her skirts, to find that pearl again, and pinch and hold it until she came apart with a long, throaty groan.

“Shhhh, sweetheart, you will get us caught. Not a sound now”, Hyde whispered to her cheek, pressing his face to hers, licking and biting up and down her neck, while he shoved her up the wall with each thrust. A distant corner of her mind realized that she would probably leave a wet spot on the expensive silken wallpaper, maybe even smear the print with her drool and her sweat, from her face pressed to the wall, from her whole body, and she almost giggled, imagining an imprint of her cleavage on the wall where she had been fucked…She groaned again, because the word sounded so dirty in her mind, and it was one Hyde sometimes used. He bit her earlobe then, and pinched the pearl again, making her buckle against him.

“What did I tell you? Soon all of the guests of this terrible soirée will come into the corridor to find out what the meaning of this noise is. Would you like them to see you like this, pet?”

“No.” Belle panted, and the word was a single, strangled moan. Hyde cupped her sex, gently rubbing her, because she was too sensitive now to bear another hard rub, or a pinch, but his constant caress sent her reeling nevertheless, and she saw the stars for a second time when he thrust into her for the last time, nearly crushing her between himself and the wall. Belle gave off a high, whining sound with her second climax, and Hyde bit her shoulder to muffle his own groaning sound. When they slowly came down from their high, leaning panting and shaking against the wall and each other, Belle heard a muffled giggle somewhere down the hallway, and froze.

“Hyde…I think someone saw us”, she whispered, and he chortled, the bastard.

“Quite possible. You were a naughty thing, darling. I think we should practice the silence thing again…” He stepped back, letting her skirts fall down to cover her again, but Belle still needed the wall to support her.

“I’d like to sneak out the back”, she said, while Hyde buttoned up her dress again.

“Well, we have to, anyway. You can’t walk out the front with your monster at your heels, now can you?” He pressed another kiss to the nape of her neck, gentle this time, and Belle let herself fall back, against his chest. She was not sure if her legs would hold her up any longer, but then, they didn’t have to. Hyde might have been just as spent as she herself, but as a true monster, he still had enough strength left to pick her up into his arms and carry her out the back of the house and into their waiting carriage. Sometimes, a monster was quite handy to have around, and if she was honest with herself, she liked his way of debauching her more than she ever would admit aloud. Unless, of course, he found a way to make her say it. Which was not so unlikely.

“Oh, darn. We forgot your cane”, she said, when the carriage was slowly making its way through the streets, and Hyde snorted.

“Well, it will be interesting to retrieve it. I’d like to see the blush on Mrs. Nolan’s face when she sees you again.”

Belle groaned. Of course he had known that they were being watched. And of course he knew by whom. He giggled, high-pitched and gleeful, and patted her knee, and Belle swallowed another foul name.

“Send Jekyll to do it. That will be even more fun. Just don’t tell him what we did.”

This time, Belle could not hold it back. “Beast”, she hissed, not for the first and certainly not for the last time.


	21. Play with me

Jekyll was furious, but his rage was ice cold and well contained. He had come to accept that he had to share his wife and his love with the monster inside him, had come to accept that this monster connected with Belle on a more carnal level, reached her in ways he himself could never dream of, but still, he hated it. And going to retrieve his cane from the Nolan’s house after he passed out the evening before, to be met with a mixture of disgust and boyish admiration was one of the most humiliating exercises those two had put him through to date. Belle could have warned him. But she didn’t, and for the first time since he became aware of his love for her, he wanted to punish her.

When he had knocked at the door of Nolan’s place, a butler had informed him that Mrs. Nolan was indisposed, but Mr. Nolan was already awake. He met the man in the morning salon, where he read his paper and sipped on his morning tea. When Jekyll entered the room, Nolan let his paper sink into his lap and greeted him with a wink that was disgustingly equivocal, and clicked his tongue.

“Dr. Jekyll! I didn’t expect to see you again.”

“Yes? Why not?”

The butler entered the room again and brought his cane with him, extending it with a look so disapproving and indignant that Jekyll began to wonder what exactly had happened after he passed out. When he turned in a fit of rage, Hyde was usually stronger and pushed him far into the back of their consciousness. In cases like that, he usually had no idea what his other half had been up to.

“Well…” Nolan chuckled, and the feeling of uneasiness increased. “Kathryn was shocked to witness her guests doing that in her house…Not that it kept her from witnessing it from beginning to end, mind you, but still…” The blonde man shrugged, and a suspicion as to what the nature of that shocking incident was began to form in Jekyll. He knew Belle. He knew that she had a slight…affinity to give in to her needs no matter the surroundings – after all, he himself had taken her propped up against a wall in a shady alleyway – and Hyde relished in exploiting that inclination of hers. But still…in a respectable townhouse, with an ongoing soirée?

“Tell me something, Jekyll”, Nolan said now, leaning forward in his armchair and looking at him as if he hoped to find the holy grail. “How do you get your wife to do these things with you? Is it her lower birth? Kathryn would castrate me if I tried to sleep with her in a hallway when there was even the slightest chance of being watched…”

Jekyll tightened the grip on his cane, feeling his wrath flare up, both at the revelation what had happened the evening before, and at the man’s disrespect towards Belle.

“You’re talking about my wife here, Nolan. And contrary to common belief, there is nothing in a person’s birth or class that makes him or her into a better or more depraved person. Maybe your wife just doesn’t hold you in the same high esteem my wife holds me, and I hold my wife.”

Nolan straightened and wore an expression of consternation. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to insinuate that your wife is somehow less worthy than mine. That was just my way of expressing my envy.”

It was disgusting how this man wore his heart on his sleeve, making big and sorry eyes that reminded Jekyll of Annie’s tadpole monster. Pathetic. Besides, he was too furious to accept an apology now (or make one himself), so he just left.

On his way home, his rage festered into the burning desire to show Belle that she didn’t need Hyde to take care of all her needs and desires. True, he and Belle shared their bed often enough, and he treasured the gentleness and tenderness of holding her and being held more than the act itself, but ever since he found that shocking letter his other half had written, he wondered if Belle could even be happy if she just had him. If he was enough for her.

When he came home, after a little detour to purchase a gift, he found her cuddling and reading with Annie, but when he entered the library, her eyes flew up, and she looked so guilty that he almost forgave her on the spot for putting him through the humiliation of retrieving his cane from Nolan’s. Almost.

“Annie, find Hopper and his goat, sweetie, I need your Mama to do something for me, alright?”

Annie grunted, surprising him once more with the noises his sweet little girl could produce, but she did as he said. While she hopped out of the room, Belle watched him, biting her lips and clearly harboring a guilty conscience. Good.

“Bedroom”, he said, and her eyes widened. He never talked to her like that, and it shocked himself just as much as it shocked her. But she rose from the couch and walked past him to the door, a rosy glow covering her cheeks. He walked behind her, up the stairs and into the bedroom, and when she halted and turned to face him, he tossed the package he had been carrying onto their bed.

“Henry…”

“Put that on, Belle. We’re going out.”

She creased her forehead, staring at the package, and back at him.

“What is it?”

“It’s a dress, darling. Do you want me to wait downstairs until you’re ready?”

“What’s wrong with the dresses I have?” She was watching him with squinted eyes full of mistrust, and he stepped close to press a kiss to her trembling lips.

“They don’t fit the occasion, darling. We’re going out to play. Oh, and…no drawers.”

She gasped at that, but in the end, she stopped protesting, and Jekyll went downstairs to wait for her to change. When she finally came down, her face burnt deep red, and he had to swallow down a snicker, because she had extracted one of her thickest and longest coats out of her closet, to cover herself from head to toe.

“You won’t need the coat, darling. Take it off, it’s not that cold.”

“But the dress…I look like one of the harlots on Cheapside.”

“Exactly. So we’ll blend in, and no one takes notice if I were to examine the goods.”

“Examine…What the hell?” She squared her shoulders and glared at him, and for a moment, he wondered if it really was a good idea to act on his plan. But then he remembered the way Nolan had waggled his eyebrows at him, and that hardened his resolve.

“You didn’t care yesterday that everyone could have seen you – and that you indeed have been seen. Instead, you sent me back into that house without so much as a warning. Did you think that funny?”

“Hyde did, and I couldn’t bring myself to tell you. I hoped they would have enough decency to just keep quiet about it.”

“Guess what. They didn’t.”

“And now you want to get back at me?”

“No. I want to show you that you don’t need Hyde to fulfill your desires.” He stepped to her and peeled her out of the coat, and Belle let him do so with her face crinkled in confusion and, not very surprising, anticipation. Usually, she was the one taking the lead and guiding him (he still blushed thinking about the chains in the bedroom), but this time, it was his turn. When he had discarded the coat, he bent down to her and kissed her, a fleeting and soft contact of skin on skin to reassure her of his love.

The dress wasn’t so bad, in truth. It revealed a great deal more skin than she was used to, and presented her breasts in a way that could knock a man out, making them look far more voluminous than they actually were, and apart from the cheap and flimsy fabric and the screaming colors, he found himself liking it quite a lot. So, before they left, he cupped her cheek and pressed a kiss to that tender spot beneath her earlobe, and whispered into her ear, his voice only a deep growl. “You look gorgeous, dear. I could get used to that.”

Belle sighed, and he felt the tension leave her a little.

“So, where are we going?” she asked, once they were seated in a hackney and making their way through the streets.

“Fleet street. There is a pie shop that makes stunning meat pies.”

Belle grimaced, but he didn’t know if it was due to their destination or to the fact that he wanted to take her to a crowded tavern where everyone would see her in this dress. He smiled, thinly and a little more gleeful than he usually was. Somewhere at the back of his consciousness, he felt his other half rage and fight his restraints, but for now, Hyde was tucked safely away.

The pie shop had rows of tables with wooden benches in the dim guestroom, and was overcrowded and loud, but they were able to find a place to sit in one of the corners. When Belle wanted to slip behind the table, at his side, he held her back, but he couldn’t hold back the grin.

“Sit on my lap, darling. There is not enough room for both of us side by side.” In truth, they could have easily squeezed onto the bench side by side, and the other guest occupying their table scooted even farther away after receiving an icy glare from Jekyll, but that wouldn’t have fitted into his plan.

“Are you sure? What about your leg?”

Instead of answering, he sat down and pulled her with him, and she stumbled onto his lap in a cloud of flimsy petticoats and skirts, ending up with her back pressed to his chest and her hands grabbing the edge of their table.

“That was not very nice of you”, she said through clenched teeth, and he chortled, inhaling her scent on the nape of her neck, and grasped her waist to pull her even closer.

“It’s what I want, little dove, so it’s what we’ll do.”

“Little dove? Really?” She raised her eyebrows in a mocking grin, but she grinded her backside against him, a movement that made him feel much tighter all of a sudden. When a service girl made her way through the crowd and to their table, he was already hard, and glad for Belle’s clothes hiding him. He ordered ale and a pie, and the girl wandered off with a disdainful look at Belle.

“She looks at me as if I was a strumpet”, Belle said, and sucked in air when he hooked the handle of his cane into the neckline of her dress, between her breasts, and pulled it a little down, just enough for one of her aureoles to peek out, a tiny patch of darker skin that no one would notice.

“You look like one, darling.” He kissed the crook of her neck and felt a shiver run through her. “If you want to go, just tell me, and we’ll go, alright?” he said, and Belle nodded, staring ahead with big eyes and slightly trembling. She didn’t know what he was up to, and it made her nervous. And he was sure that there was a difference between a deserted corridor or a dark and lonely alley, and a overcrowded guestroom in a tavern, even if she was by far not the only scantily clad woman around, and not even the only one sitting on a man’s lap. They were in a part of London where decency stood back and watched gluttony and lust have their wicked ways.

“Try to act natural”, he whispered, while dragging up her skirts with the handle of his cane, sheltered from view by the table, until he could slip his hand beneath them and caress her inner thigh. She gasped, and tensed, and he chuckled. “No one will see it, Belle, unless you start getting noisy.”

She let her head fall forward, and he felt the glow on her skin when he pressed his face to her neck, felt the tremors, and her little sighs as he grasped her knee and pulled her legs further apart. His own skin felt too tight, itching with the need for release. The service maid found her way back to them, placing his order in front of them and taking his money that he shoved towards her with his free hand, while his other made Belle twitch as he found her centre and tickled her. She had heeded his request and wore no drawers, and his fingertips found her already wet and silken. She tried so very hard to look unfazed, even when he parted her folds to wet his fingertips before he circled the pearl that made her squirm on his lap and grind against his painfully hard member. He gritted his teeth just like she clenched her jaws.

“Eat, darling. You don’t want anyone to notice, now do you?” He kissed her neck again and noticed the dampness of her heated skin. Her breathing came shallow, flat, and pride surged through him. He did that to her, and even if someone should notice what they were doing under that table, it wouldn’t lessen the delight of having that beautiful woman sitting on his lap and writhing in the pleasure he gave her. She was his, and he wanted everyone to see it. When she didn’t take up the cutlery to start eating, he pinched her, and was rewarded with a jerking of her hips and a strangled sound deep in her throat.

“I can’t eat like that”, she said, and gave off a breathless moan when he pushed two fingers deep into her silken wetness. He felt her shaking, her legs trembling violently, and when she pressed her behind against him, he rolled his hips a little to increase the pressure on his cock. He was aching to feel more, and while he placed his chin on her shoulder and nibbled at her neck, he imagined to bend her over that table and take her in front of everyone, branding her, while she screamed his name. It was a fantasy he only ever allowed himself when he was weak, worn down by the strain of desire, and rage. It was a fantasy that belonged much more to Hyde than to himself, and therefore had to be shut away carefully.

“Then what’s to be done about that? You have to look a little more composed, my dear. Your pleasure is showing.” And he made very sure of her pleasure, slowly pushing in and out of her and rubbing the heel of his hand over her little pearl. Belle groaned under her breath, grabbing the edge of the table again, and Jekyll noticed a man on the neighboring table muster her with his eyebrows raised in interest. Her breathless little moans were drowned out by the noisy chatter of countless hungry guests in the crammed tavern, by laughter and shouting, but even when her sounds went unnoticed, her face couldn’t hide her delight. Her lust made her even more beautiful, illuminating her cheeks with a rosy glow, wetting her lips, and making her flutter her lashes with every wave of pleasure he sent through her. The man on the other table looked away when Jekyll sent a glare in his direction, but not without a wink and a dirty grin. “Tell me, darling, what shall we do?” Jekyll rasped against her heated skin, and Belle pressed her open thighs against his and grinded her hips.

“Make me come”, she whispered, and that needy plea alone almost finished him. He found the pearl and rubbed along it, found the places where he knew she liked his touch the most, and she tensed, held her breath, just as he did when his climax took him and he spilled himself inside his trousers, pressed to her backside, clenching his jaw to keep himself from making any sound. Belle relaxed, almost slumping into a heap on his lap, and he slowly pulled his hand out from under her skirts, not without a last push inside her and a flick of his wet fingertips over her most sensitive spot.

“Happy, darling?” He asked, wiping his hand on his pants, although he rather let her lick it clean. But that would have been too obvious, so he shut that wish away with all the other wants and desires he rarely ever allowed to surface. Belle nodded, and for the fraction of a moment, he allowed himself a smug grin.

“That was intense. But I think we shouldn’t eat that meat pie.” She pointed her chin to the pasty they had ordered, cooled down by now, but still smelling rather delicious.

“Why not? Of course, we can take it with us if you want to go home.”

“It’s not that. It smells odd.” She slipped down from his lap to sit at his side, covering herself up as demurely as possible with the dress. He didn’t tell her that one of her nipples was still peeking over the edge of her dress, because deep inside, he liked it to see her so completely ravished and indecent. And compared to the harlot that just sat down two tables further down the row, towing along a man in an ugly striped suit, Belle still looked rather modest.

“Ah well. Then let’s just drink our ale and go home, shall we?”

She beamed up at him, still wearing the face of a thoroughly pleased squirrel, and he had to pull her into his arms and kiss her then. She would probably make him pay for this adventure, but he found himself looking forward to that. She was his, completely, and he would relish his luck till he took his last breath.


	22. Wolftime Retreat

Belle didn’t notice that something wasn’t as it ought to be until it was almost too late.

They didn’t put down the whole pack of wolves that had attacked them, simply because they vanished. Belle would have preferred to spend wolftimes somewhere else, but, although Henry was rich, he wasn’t that rich, and wild places like this one were hard to come by. So, once a month, they traveled to Scotland and spent a few days at the castle, Belle roaming the grounds, and Hyde with Annie never far from her. And they never saw nor smelled the faintest hint of the other wolves. They were gone.

Annie was four when they came back.

Belle and Henry had visited Loch Ness with their daughter on their way, hoping to see Annie’s tadpole-monster, and it was already after dawn that day when they finally arrived at the castle. Annie had changed in the coach as soon as the moon came out, and Hyde had taken her out to run alongside the coach while Belle slept inside. She slept a lot as of late, and she was glad that she had mastered nature so far that not even the full moon forced her into wolf form. She awoke when the coach rattled over the cobblestones in front of their residence, and Hyde helped her to climb out while Annie, not in the least bit tired, alternated between gnawing on his boot (still on his foot) and hopping around the yard with Peter the wolf.

“I didn’t know you’re such a gentleman”, Belle quipped, and Hyde waggled his eyebrows in a way that looked at the same time filthy and sweet.

“I’m not, darling, but it looks as if I have to prove it to you again and again.”

“Well, I like you being all gentlemanly and considerate.”

He snorted, stepped behind her and slipped his hand around her waist, pulling her closer, and Belle felt his breath gust over her neck when he pressed a wet kiss to her skin and whispered into her ear. “You’re lying, dear, and I can hardly wait to show you the error of your ways.”

Belle was spared to answer – and really, what was there to answer, beside admitting that he made her knees utterly weak and her mind a little foggy – when Annie attacked his boots again and almost bit through the leather this time.

“Our daughter seems hungry”, Hyde complained, and Belle had to bite back a smile. The smile fell from her face as soon as the smell hit her nostrils.

“They’re back”, she whispered, and Hyde didn’t need to ask whom she meant. He whirled around, grabbing Annie by the fur in her neck and nearly crushing her against his chest in his attempt to shield her. Her daughter yelped and buried her teeth in Hyde’s arm, but he seemed to hardly notice it.

“Where?” he hissed, but Belle couldn’t tell. The stink of wolves was everywhere, and it made the skin of her neck prickle, just like her fur would bristle when she changed into her wolf form. That was the moment when Belle realized that she was unable to change.

“Edward, something’s wrong”, she whispered, but she had no time to tell him. Out of the shadows to their right, a ragged figure emerged, human, but reeking of wolf.

“I’m not here to attack”, the man rasped, but Belle didn’t believe a word he said. She remained standing at Edward’s side, and she ignored his gaze flitting to her, confused and waiting for her to explode.

“Why are you here, then?”

“To establish a truce. We don’t want to do you harm, and don’t want to be harmed in return. You killed enough of us before we left this place. Now we are back, and we don’t want the killing to resume.”

“You attacked us first.” Belle couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice. She still felt the horror of that moment lingering at the edge of her mind whenever they came here. The moment that other wolf had held a gun to her head, shot Henry, and his side kick flung Annie over the railing of the gallery, still haunted her dreams from time to time.

“That was the doing of our packmaster back then.” At least the wolf didn’t deny their doings. Belle looked him up and down. His clothes were dirty and tattered, his beard shaggy, and he was too thin to be healthy. But his posture was submissive, and although Belle could not change, her wolf senses told her that he was telling the truth. At least for now.

“Who’s your packmaster now?”

“It’s me.”

“We accept your truce. But if you come near this castle and its grounds again, or act in any way hostile, we’ll hunt you down and end your pack.”

The wolf backed away, his ears tucked between his shoulders, and bending down. Only when he was almost swallowed by the darkness did he turn away to leave. Still, the tension didn’t leave Belle until they were safely inside and the heavy doors were locked and bolted. Annie wriggled out of her father’s arms and scurried to Belle, pressing herself to her mother’s side and sending a glare to Hyde that told him she had not forgiven him for handling her so roughly. He crouched down, tried to coax her back, but it didn’t work. Annie was sulking.

“Children”, he sighed, and got back to his feet to press a kiss to Belle’s brow. “That was tense, dear. Why didn’t you change and snap his neck?”

Of course he wouldn’t see a problem in eliminating a threat by killing it. Belle started to pace, lighting candles in the hall with the big fireplace, the very room where the first attack had taken place.

“I couldn’t”, she admitted then, when the golden light filled even the last corner of the room and she was sure that there was no one lurking in any dark corners.

“What does that mean?” Hyde himself followed her around, always at her heels, always close, as if he was sniffing her nervousness and tried to increase it even more.

“I don’t know! I wanted to, but it didn’t work. And the last time that was…” She trailed off, and her eyes found Annie, rolled to a furry little ball in front of the fireplace, Peter resting at her back like a watchdog. He watched Hyde always with suspicion and obeyed only Belle and Annie (and sometimes Henry, accepting him gruffly as the Alpha at Belle’s side), but never Hyde. The animal sensed that there was a part of Hyde that couldn’t be trusted, the true monster lying underneath all his more or less monstrous traits. The part that even Belle was not always able to tame. And when Hyde now came up to her, stepping behind her and wrapping his arms around her, the wolf bared his fangs in a low growl. He stopped immediately and ducked when Belle bared her teeth at him and growled in return. She was packmaster of this pack, and she didn’t allow animosities, especially not between her daughter’s pet and her husband.

“When was the last time, sweetheart?” Hyde rumbled against her neck, and Belle shivered. His hot breath made her grow warm inside.

“When I was with child. When I was pregnant.”

Hyde’s grip on her tensed, but he relaxed it again the very next moment. “You mean…Could you be pregnant again?”

“Well, it isn’t as if we lived celibate.”

Hyde chuckled and pressed his face to the crook of her neck, scraping his teeth over her skin and trailing a line of kisses up to her ear. “Indeed not”, he whispered. “And since it’s already too late…want to abstain from chastity a little more?”

Belle sank back against his chest and let him hold her. Maybe it wasn’t the worst thing to enjoy his company a little more, before she had to tell Jekyll. Because Henry would do his utmost to keep Hyde away from her for the next nine months then.


	23. Telling Henry

“There is something you’re not telling me.“ Henry kissed her neck, a gentle sweep of his lips on her skin, and Belle shivered. She met his eyes in the mirror of her dressing table when he straightened again, and there was a deep frown on his forehead.

“What do you mean?” Of course she knew what he meant; she was just not ready yet to tell him. She had realized a week ago that she was pregnant again, and given her past experience with telling him such news, she was nervous.

“I can feel it, Hyde knows something, and I just can’t reach it. Tell me what it is.” He placed his hands on her shoulders, his grip tender, but growing the tiniest bit faster when she didn’t answer and avoided his eyes. She didn’t like him in this mood, when he wore menace and determination like a cloak, hiding his claws behind tenderness. In a way, Belle found Jekyll in his gloomy mood a lot more threatening than Hyde, who wore his monstrosity at least open and undisguised.

“It’s nothing, really.”

“You’re lying. I can hear it in your voice, and in the pretty way you avert your eyes.” The silky tone of his voice made her skin crawl, and that made her furious. She loved him beyond reason, but she hated his moods. Belle shrugged his hands off her shoulders, rose and turned to face him. Her anger stained her skin with ugly red blotches on her chest, and he took a step back, shrinking away from her wrath. She was just as dangerous as he was.

“Dr. Henry Jekyll, stop acting like an idiot and stop being jealous of yourself. If there was something I needed to tell you, then I would do so when I see the time fit. Not a moment before that, do you understand?”

“I do, but you have to admit that you and Hyde plotted against me before. So excuse my distrusting the two of you.”

“I will absolutely not excuse that.”

For a moment they just stared at each other, the air crackling and too thick to breathe, and Belle knew, if she had been able to change, she would have lunged for his throat. Not with the intention to kill him, of course. Just to make a point. His eyes strayed from her heated face down to her cleavage, trembling above her corset and the thin chemise, and Belle wondered if he started their fights on purpose always then when she wasn’t properly dressed. Maybe he did, since their fights tended to end with them scratching each other out of their clothes and devouring each other whole. When he narrowed his eyes, however, she realized that her pregnancy had already caused a certain change, and she hoped he wouldn’t notice. But he was a doctor. Of course he noticed.

“Is that a new corset?” he asked, and she wished he would look back into her eyes. Even if it was a lot harder to lie while upholding eye-contact.

“Don’t change the subject.” That brought his eyes up to her face again, and his nostrils flared as if he smelled something to hunt down.

“Something about you is changed, darling. And I want to know what it is.” He stepped closer, as if he could intimidate her with his body. Of course he couldn’t, and he knew it well enough. But he challenged her nevertheless.

“Why don’t you trust me?” she asked, and he took another step towards her, unsteady, since his cane leant beside the door.

“I do trust you more than anyone. But I also know you better than anyone.”

“Then you should know that you’re treading dangerous grounds right now.”

“Do I? Why don’t you show me?”

“Because that wouldn’t help the problem. It’s not a solution if we always end our conflicts by shagging them out.”

His eyebrows shot upwards, and he made a face as if he just collided with a lamp post. Belle blushed. She didn’t use words like this often, and right now, her husband looked at her as if he didn’t know her.

“I think you spend too much time with that filthy scum Hyde. It shows.” He wanted to turn away, but that was just one insult too many, one Belle neither wanted to hear nor to take. As sweet and worshipping Jekyll was most of the time, when he had a temper, his brain ceased proper functioning.

“Henry Jekyll, if you don’t want me to torture you, you sit down on that bed and do as I say. Or there will be consequences.” Something in the tone of her voice startled him, and he sagged down on the bed as if she had punctuated him with a needle and all air was leaving him with a faint whistling noise. Belle planted herself in front of him, arms akimbo and her jaws clenched with rage.

“Belle…”

“Shut up. What do you think why I am angry at you?”

Jekyll shifted on the bed and tried to avoid her eyes. She could see sweat beading above his brows, and he kneaded the fabric of his pants, rubbing his thighs with the heel of his hands.

“Maybe because I pointed out the truth about Hyde.”

“You stubborn ass. Hyde is not filthy scum. You are not filthy scum.”

Still he avoided her eyes. “Belle, you have no idea how he thinks about you…”

“And you have? If you know so well what he’s thinking, why don’t you take a look to find out what you think we’re plotting against you?”

“He doesn’t let me…there are some areas I just can’t reach.”

“That must be annoying for someone with such a hunger for control like you.”

“Belle, he’s corrupting you.” For the first time he met her eyes, and he was pleading for her to understand. Well, she understood, but that didn’t make it any more acceptable. It itched under her skin to throw something, to hit him or bang some doors, but she knew she couldn’t walk out on it now.

“It sounds like I’m corrupting you. You believe I’m always working against you with Hyde, you believe I’m keeping secrets and secretly laugh about you behind your back, and all of this makes you seethe with rage and lose your handle on your other side, makes you lose control over Hyde and leads you to mistrust me, and resent me for it. Do you have any idea how hurtful this is?”

“Belle…”

“No, stop Belle-ing me. I love you more than you’ll ever know, more than you’ll ever believe, and it destroys me that I can’t be honest with you, because I know you’ll take that other part of you, that I love just as much, away from me. I don’t want that to happen. Why don’t you believe me that I love you, all of you?” Against her will, she felt tears prick her eyes, and she tried desperately to blink them away. She was the strong one between the two of them, so she had to act like it. She couldn’t break down now, not in front of him.

“Belle, sweetheart, I’m sorry. I just can’t fathom why anyone would love me, least of all someone who knows not only me, but all my ugliness, all of the monster I truly am…”

“Why do you still doubt me? We’re married for five years now. Don’t you think it’s time for you to stop worrying?”

Jekyll reached out and took her hands into his much bigger ones, pulling her gently closer, until their knees bumped against each other, and he started to rub circles onto the back of her hands with his thumbs. “I fear the time when you no longer will be able to forgive me my mistakes and shortcomings”, he whispered, bending down his head. Belle stared down at the crown of his head, and she wondered if that day would come. She wanted to tell him that she’d always forgive him, but she didn’t know if it was true.

“I want you to promise me something, Henry.”

“Anything, my love.” He looked up, and there was still that pleading look in his eyes, begging her to believe him.

“Promise me not to take Hyde away from me if I tell you our secret.”

A muscle in his cheek twitched, and his nose seemed to grow sharper, like always when he clenched his jaws and pressed his lips together. “Anything but this.”

Belle yanked her hands out of his grip and made them to fists. “Promise me.”

“So there is a secret, and I was right all along.”

“Yes, you stupid, stubborn moron of a man. I am pregnant, you’re going to be a father again. So there is your secret, do as you please with it. I only wished that for once in my life, things needn’t to be complicated with you.” Belle thrust her hands in the air and turned to storm out of the room, disregarding her half dressed state and the disbelief on his face. She just wanted to leave. But she had forgotten that Jekyll, although not half as agile as Hyde, could still move swiftly if he had to, and she didn’t make it out of their bedroom. Jekyll leapt to his feet and came after her, grabbing her arms, swirling her around with so much momentum that her back crashed against the door and she found herself pinned between him and the wood in her back, the air knocked out of her lungs.

“Say that again”, he rasped, and Belle drew a deep breath.

“You stupid, stubborn moron of a man.”

“You are so absolutely right. I am the stupidest, stubbornest moron of a man that ever lived.”

For a moment, Belle feared that it was all over now, that he would cast her out because he thought that their whole relationship had been a mistake from the start, and she felt herself tremble. And when he leaned closer, his face so close that their lips were almost touching, she bared her teeth, ready to bury them in his lip until she drew blood.

“Forgive me, Belle, for making you think you couldn’t tell me about the baby, out of fear I would deprive you of the affection of your monster.” He rested his forehead against hers, relaxing his grip on her arms, but Belle was still not sure if he was being honest or sarcastic.

“Could you please let go of me?”

He let go as if he had burned himself, stepping back, with that horror on his face that showed his shock, as if he just now realized the way he had just handled her. Belle rubbed her upper arms and bit her lip. It wasn’t so much the roughness of his touch, or the unexpectedness of it that had shocked her, because she wasn’t made of glass, and she was almost glad he finally learned that, too. It was just that she needed some physical distance to be able to figure him out. She was too confused to judge his mood right now, and it didn’t get easier with the breathlessness and heat that came with his closeness.

“So…you won’t take Hyde away from me?”

“Of course not. I couldn’t if I tried.”

“Good. Because I would need to teach you the error of your ways otherwise.” Belle lifted her chin, and Henry chuckled, tilting his head and letting his gaze wander down from her face to her chest.

“Don’t give me incentives to try, darling. I’d very much like you to teach me a thing or two…By the way, now I can see what’s changed. Pregnancy does become you.”

Belle huffed angrily, and pushed him back to the bed. “You’re naughty, Dr. Jekyll. I’m going to start teaching you right now.”

Henry grinned when he fell backwards onto the bed, and he didn’t object when she straddled him and pressed her lips to his throat, biting down to mark him as hers. It was time to remind him of it.


	24. To Be Enough

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was previously published on AO3, under the same title.

Belle wished it had been different this time. She was still not over the fact that Annie’s fangs had forced her to stop feeding her baby herself, and the sweet ache of nursing a baby was something she looked forward to with her second child. And it seemed as if it would turn out better this time. Eliza didn’t turn into a wolf pup when Belle’s wolftime returned with the first full moon after giving birth. She didn’t grow fangs either, and for all of four months, she seemed like a normal baby. Then she turned, too, and just like Annie, she grew a perfect set of fangs that wouldn’t disappear after wolftime faded, forcing Belle once more to give up breastfeeding, lest her daughter would bite her bloody every time she fed.

“I’m not ready yet.”

“I know, sweetheart, but there’s nothing to be done about it. You can’t just pull her teeth.” Hyde played with strands of her hair, wrapping them around his fingers and raking over her scalp, and Belle sighed and shifted to lean her cheek against his chest. They were huddled up in bed, Hyde leaning against the headboard and Belle leaning against him, tucked between his legs, and she listened to the steady beat of his heart.

“I know. But it’s so soon. I’m not ready to give it up.”

“How egoistical of you.” His tone was playful as he nuzzled her hair, but it stung regardless. Belle pushed herself up and away from his naked chest, turning around to face him.

“How can you say that? I’m not only upset on my behalf. Eliza will have no idea why I will no longer feed her, and it’s a lot of stress for her. She doesn’t like the bottle, she’s not like Annie.” Tears pricked her eyes, but Belle bit them back and instead concentrated on her fury. Hyde stopped playing with her hair and grabbed her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes.

“There’s nothing you can do. Accept it.”

“Easy for you to say. You have no idea what it means for a mother and a child. How it feels.”

Hyde let go of her chin, and Belle moved her jaw from side to side to get rid of the pain his grip had caused her.

“You’re right, I have no idea. So, tell me.”

Belle licked her lips and searched for words. It was hard to put the bond that nursing her child created into words, and for once, she wished she would face Henry. It was so much easier to talk to Henry rationally. She wrung her hands and took a deep breath, and she closed her eyes when she started talking to find the words within her. She knew they were lingering somewhere between her heart and her throat, in that tight space that held her love.

“It’s like...the first time you hold your child, you’re flooded with that incredible love, a love that is so much bigger than anything you felt before, a love that bursts you open and creates a star within you...and the moment you nurse your child for the first time, when its little mouth closes around you and sucks your nipple in, almost painfully, you’re afraid at first, afraid of the pain, afraid it won’t work, afraid that maybe you’re not enough for your child. But then it suckles, and you feel the sweet pain when your breast starts lactating, and it washes over you and recreates that moment when your love filled you to the brim for the first time, and each time you nurse your child, that moment is recreated, and it aches so sweetly, and pleasurable...I don’t know if you ever grow tired of this feeling. I’m not yet there.” Belle’s breasts had started leaking milk while she talked, and her nightgown clung wet and cool to her skin. She folded her arms in front of her chest to hide the wet spots, but Edward clasped her wrists and pried her hands down, gently, but insistent.

“Don’t hide it, precious. I like to see it.”

Belle was unable to meet his gaze, and she looked away from him when he pulled at the laces that closed her nightgown at the front. His fingertips whispered over her skin when he shoved the thin fabric aside to bare her breasts, and she swallowed air when he grazed her nipples. The ache in her breasts intensified, and she felt milk trickle down her front.

“Look at me, precious”, he rasped, and brushed his thumb over her chin to turn her head. Belle bit her lip to keep it from trembling when she met his unblinking eyes. “So, it gives you pleasure?” he asked, and captured a droplet of her milk with his index finger, where it sat white and tiny until he licked it off.

“It does. But it’s more than just that.”

“I see.” Hyde grasped her hips and pulled her closer, guiding her to straddle him, and Belle felt his growing hardness pressing to her. He bent his head and brought his lips close to her nipple, but he looked up to meet her eyes before closing the distance. “May I?” he asked, and Belle nodded, breathless and trembling. She groaned when he closed his lips around her nipple and thrust her head back, overwhelmed by the sensation his mouth caused her. Hyde cupped her aching breasts, spreading her milk on her skin, and she pressed against his lips, urging him to suck her nipple deeper into his mouth. It felt different from feeding a child, and Hyde didn’t suckle like her babe did. It was almost uncomfortable at first, and Belle grabbed a fistful of his locks to pull his head back. He let go of her nipple with a plop. She felt his member twitch against the cleft between her thighs and moved her hips to rub herself to him.

“You have to do it differently, love, otherwise it hurts. Open your mouth, and suck in the whole nipple, with the areole, not only the tip.” She cupped her other breast to guide the nipple into his mouth, and this time, he did it right, releasing a wave of pleasure that washed over her whole body, making her roll her eyes and groan deep in her throat. Her other breast still leaked milk, and Hyde spread it until her skin was slick with it. His hands wandered down, grabbing her bottom to pull her even closer, pushing her up to her knees, so he could sneak a hand under her nightgown to part her folds, pulsing with her desire. Heat coiled in her lower belly when he found her most sensitive spot and rubbed it, his fingertips slippery, coated with her wetness. Belle held on to his shoulders to centre herself in a world that had started to spin, and she exhaled with a sigh when he slowly guided her down, to impale her on his cock. Hyde let go of her nipple and cupped her face to pull her down for a kiss, and she tasted her sweet milk on his tongue.

“Edward...” He thrust upwards, ripping his name from her lips, and she answered his every move by gently rocking against him, breathing deeply in the quiet of their bedroom.

“You taste so sweet, my precious”, he whispered, cupping her breasts again and brushing his thumbs over her nipples. Belle arched her back into his touch, and pulled his head down again to her breasts. Her skin prickled and stung and was too taut, too tense, aching for relief, and shivers ran down her spine when he kissed her again, licking up the milk she spilled.

“They’re so hot and hard, darling. Do they hurt?” he asked, squeezing her breasts tenderly, and Belle almost sobbed.

“Yes. Yes, they do. Please...” She didn’t know how to voice her need, so instead she arched her back and brushed her nipple over his lips, moaning in relief when he sucked it into his mouth again to drink from her. She moved faster, her skin itching, feeling too hot and too tight, and Hyde wrapped his arms around her to press her into a fast embrace, making it almost impossible for her to move.

“Please, Edward, I need...”

“What, darling? Say it.” He grinned at her and started to nibble at her throat, and Belle tried to move her hips to create friction. He answered her with a hoarse groan and moved his lips to the crook of her neck, to suck and bite her, making the heat between her pelvic bones coil tighter and tighter, until she felt as if she would burst any moment.

“Make me come. Please make me come.” Belle sobbed and pressed her chest to his, hoping the pressure would somehow relieve her from the heat searing through her insides, and their bodies slipped against each other like eels in the slickness of milk and sweat. Hyde made a sound deep inside his throat, somewhere between a growl and a chuckle, and kissed his way down to the tip of her breast again. He wriggled a hand between them and pinched the little pearl between her folds when he sucked in her nipple, and Belle cried out when the heat inside her finally uncoiled, like the explosion of a star, and her climax washed over her. She was shaking and trembling when Hyde turned her over to lie on her back, still joined, and he grunted and started to thrust, hard and deep. Belle felt her muscles convulse around him, and each of his thrusts made her scream his name anew.

“Isn’t this enough pleasure for you, my precious? Tell me.” Hyde panted out the words, and his gaze didn’t allow her to avert her eyes.

“I love you... but I will always love my children first.”

His next thrust was brutal, and she gasped and dug her nails deep into his arms, leaving angry red scratch marks on his yellow skin. “That isn’t what I asked, sweetheart.”

“But this is what you get, beast.” Belle grabbed a fistful of his hair and groaned when he bent down to lick over her collarbones and her throat. New heat was boiling up inside her, and she needed him deeper, and harder.

“Please, darling, tell me. Tell me that I’m enough for you.” He whispered it into her ear, and nearly smothered her beneath him, and Belle wrapped her legs around him to pull him closer. Her throat grew tight, and she swallowed a shaking sob that sat right beneath her breastbone.

“You are enough.”

Hyde stilled inside her, pulsing and pumping his seed into her with something close to a howl. Belle didn’t let go of him when he fell to her side, and she wondered what had prompted this desperation in him. She rubbed over the welts her nails had left on his skin and pressed a kiss to the crown of his head.

“Edward?”

“Yes?”

“Why are you afraid you couldn’t be enough for me?”

Hyde lifted his head and looked at her with his eyes huge and dark in his face. His nostrils flared, and he seemed to grope around for words, pressing his lips into a thin line. “I see that it kills you that you can no longer feed Eliza. You look so lost and empty. I am afraid that I can’t fill that emptiness. That I can’t replace what is broken...”

“Oh my silly, silly man...” Belle closed her eyes to hold back the tears, but they spilled over nevertheless. “I would have to stop breastfeeding eventually. I can’t feed them until they’re ready to move out into the world, can I? I just wished it had lasted a little longer, that’s all. I’m a silly, egoistical thing, and I’m sure I will stop being upset about each and every thing once Eliza is weaned and I will no longer produce milk...”

“Are you sure?”

Belle smiled and pecked the tip of his nose with a kiss. “Of course I am sure.”

Hyde sighed. “Well, I wished it would last a little longer, too. You taste delicious.”

Belle huffed and poked his shoulder, and he rewarded her with his dirtiest grin.


	25. Fever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: Character Death

Dust danced in the light falling through the window of Jekyll’s laboratory, and for a moment, Belle halted and bathed in the dancing specks of colored light falling onto the floor, reflected by a myriad of glass bottles on shelves and tables. The room was empty, and her stomach clenched when her last hope to find Annie and Eliza left her. She had looked everywhere now, from the attic, filled with quiet and cobwebs, down to the dungeon, where rusty chains dangled from the walls. Her daughters were nowhere to be found, and Belle wished she could hold onto her anger for being disobeyed – again – and shut out the fear prickling along her spine. She closed the door to the laboratory again and returned to the front of the house, making her way into the kitchen, where Hopper sat and peeled potatoes.

“No luck so far?”, he asked, and Belle shook her head. Hopper tried to smile, but it was half a grimace. “Maybe Dr. Jekyll has more luck”, he said, but he sounded doubtful.

As it turned out, Henry indeed had more luck.

“I found them in the park, playing”, he said, an hour later, after bringing both his girls home – Annie, dirty beyond recognition, her nose running and her dress torn, and Eliza, clinging to her sister’s dress with her little paddies, her eyes bright with tears, her nose shining red, and shivering in her soaked little boots. Jekyll only needed to gesture for them to line up at the foot of the stairs, and the girls, knowing they were in for a scolding, obeyed. But Annie clamped her mouth shut and frowned, looking so much like her father that Belle felt something tug inside her chest, and squeeze her heart, but she knew better than to interject. Eliza looked incredibly guilty, and afraid, and Belle wished she could just take her little girl into her arms and hold her. But first things first. Jekyll folded his hands over the handle of his cane and just looked at his daughters, down his nose, until Annie’s lower lip began to tremble. Eliza tried to swallow a sob, tried to be as brave as her sister, but it was hard for her, and big tears rolled down her chubby cheeks, painting lines into the dust of the city covering her skin.

“I’m very disappointed in you, my ladies. Your mother was worried sick. Do you have something to say to that?” Jekyll didn’t need to raise his voice to convey his authority.

“We were only at the Park. We go there almost every day!” Annie had a hard time not to stomp her foot, and Belle’s heart flew out to her daughter.

“And did you tell anyone you were going to the Park?”

Annie narrowed her eyes to slits and pouted, and Eliza chewed on her bottom lip. She was only two and a half, and to her, everything her sister said or did was law. She worshipped Annie, and now she was worried her sister would be punished for taking her to the Park.

“Daddy, we were only there for a little while, and Annie didn’t want to bite that nasty boy, I know it, but he was mean, and then she had to…” Eliza squeaked when Annie planted her foot on her toes, but it was too late.

“You bit someone?” Now Jekyll did raise his voice, and Annie seemed to shrink until she was only half her size, like a wolf pup cowering down in front of the Alpha wolf.

“It didn’t break the skin, and he was trying to hit Eliza with a stick…”

“I don’t want to hear it. You know exactly that you absolutely must not bite. Go to your room, both of you, and get cleaned up. You’re under house arrest for the next two weeks.”

Belle bit the insides of her cheeks to swallow down her own protest, and she stepped at Jekyll’s side and linked her arm to his when Annie’s eyes flew to her, expecting her mother to intervene. But Jekyll was right, and Belle would not contradict him in front of her daughters. When Annie saw that her mother wouldn’t help her, she finally stomped her foot, but then she took Eliza’s little hand and slinked up the stairs. She couldn’t keep herself from banging the door to their room shut, and Belle flinched. A muscle twitched in Jekyll’s cheek, and his nose grew a little pointier.

“Was I too hard?”, he asked, without looking at her, and Belle squeezed his arm.

“No. She has to learn that she can’t just up and leave the house with her little sister in tow. And she can’t run around and bite her way through every conflict.”

“I know…but she was right. I would have smacked that boy myself if I had been with them. Hitting a baby with a stick…He would be deaf for two weeks if I had caught him at that.”

Belle smiled and got to her tip toes, pecking his cheek with her lips. “I know, Darling. But I think that boy is probably done beating little girls with sticks. He’s probably going to have nightmares of Annie now.”

“I sincerely hope so.”

Belle’s chest got a little tighter, and her smile got a little lopsided and trembling. That night, she snuggled close to Jekyll, needing the contact from skin on skin to be able to breathe properly. Something was sitting at the back of her throat and sent tingles through her bones, and she wasn’t sure if she had even slept when she heard Eliza’s choked sobbing from across the hall. She swayed slightly when she jerked upright, and Jekyll sighed in his sleep when the sudden rush of air wafted over him. Barefoot, Belle tapped over into her daughter’s room, where she found Eliza sitting in Annie’s bed, pressing her doll to her chest and quailing.

“What is it, sweetheart?” Belle wrapped her arms around her daughter and took her up, and Eliza pressed her forehead to her collarbone and whined. Belle felt the temperature of Eliza’s skin on her forehead, but she seemed to be alright. “Did you have a nightmare?”

Eliza shook her head, and Belle cradled her gently from side to side.

“I wanted to cuddle with Annie, but she’s not well.” Her daughter sounded tiny, heartbroken, and Belle kissed her to soothe her.

“Do you want to cuddle with Daddy?”

Eliza nodded, and Belle set her down and sent her to her own bedroom, and the girl waddled over, still pressing her doll to her chest. When Eliza was gone, Belle sat down at the edge of Annie’s bed to find out what her little one meant. She gasped when she placed her hand on Annie’s forehead and found her daughter burning up with fever.

“Annie!” She turned Annie’s face to her, but her daughter groaned with pain at her touch. With trembling hands, Belle pulled back the covers to find Annie rigid and hot and shaking. “Henry!”

Jekyll came after her second call, carrying Eliza on his arm, but he shoved the toddler into Belle’s arms and knelt down at Annie’s bedside as soon as he took in the situation.

“Go and wake Hopper, we’ll need hot water and tea.” He sounded calm, and Belle was glad for it. He was a doctor. And a little fever was no catastrophe. It wasn’t the first time one of their kids was sick. Belle did as he told her and shook Hopper out of his sleep. He set to work, calm and quietly, and Belle tried to ignore the fear gnawing at her insides and tried to concentrate on her trust in Jekyll. But three sleepless nights and days later, her trust was threadbare, and Annie’s fever worse than ever. She hadn’t opened her eyes for almost a day, and again and again, she shook in fits and went completely rigid and stiff afterwards. Belle was at her side, lying in bed with her daughter and holding her when she was shaking despite the fever, renewing the wet packs that were supposed to draw the fever from her daughter every ten to twenty minutes. Jekyll was at her side most of the time, pouring medicine between Annie’s lips and watching her anxiously. His serenity didn’t waver, but Belle saw the fear in his eyes.

“You’re going to save her, Henry, you hear me? You’re going to heal her.” Belle pulled the burning body of her daughter closer. She seemed so much smaller, so frail now, and Belle’s voice was raw when she repeated again and again “You’re going to heal her.”

“She’s strong. She is a wolf, a simple fever won’t do her any harm.” He tried to sound steady, Belle saw it, but his words sounded like a question nevertheless. Belle was tired, wrung out, and she could no longer keep her eyes open.

“I trust you, Henry. You will heal her”, she murmured, pressing her face to Annie’s hair, and Jekyll bent forward to take her hand and squeeze it.

“I will. I promise, sweetheart. Sleep now.”

It was night when Belle awoke again. Annie was cool and dry in her arms, and a sob broke out of Belle’s chest when she realized that the fever was finally gone. In the dim light coming from the corridor, Belle saw Jekyll slumping on the chair at Annie’s bedside, fallen asleep from exhaustion.

“Henry, the fever is gone. She’ll be alright again.” Belle pressed Annie tighter to her chest, and fought down the relieved laugh. Jekyll startled awake, and she saw his eyes glint in the dark.

“Belle?”

“Look, Henry, the fever’s gone. You saved her.”

Jekyll slid down from the chair to kneel at Annie’s bed, and he felt her forehead. He frowned, and held the back of his hand over Annie’s pale lips. Then he felt her pulse at her neck, and his nostrils flared. Belle pressed her daughter even tighter to her chest.

“You saved her”, she whispered, when Jekyll didn’t say a word. He just knelt there, his hand at his daughter’s throat, and stared at her. “She’s sleeping the fever off”, Belle said, stroking Annie’s hair, pulling the wild locks out of Annie’s face.

“Belle…” Jekyll’s voice broke around her name, turning it into sharp shards of glass that cut through her flesh and shattered her.

“You saved her. She’s going to be alright. The fever is gone.” Belle repeated it as if she could make it true with her words alone. She didn’t want to look at Jekyll. She didn’t want to see the truth on his face.

“Belle…she’s gone.”

“No, she’s just sleeping off the fever. You saved her. She’ll be alright in the morning.”

Jekyll drew his hand back, and Belle saw him tremble, saw how he pressed his hand to his mouth as if he needed to keep a scream from breaking over his lips, heard the choking sound he made, but she didn’t believe what she saw.

“You saved her”, she said, again and again, and yelled it at him when he fell back onto the heels of his feet, still pressing his hand over his mouth. “You promised to save her!”

Someone came into the room, alerted by her voice, and brought a light, and the flickering lamp painted Annie’s pale skin golden, and Belle almost saw her breathing, saw her eyeballs almost moving behind closed lids.

“See, look at her. She’s going to be alright!”

“Belle!” Jekyll scrambled to his feet and wanted to pull her out of Annie’s bed, wanted to pull her away from her sleeping daughter, but Belle bared her teeth at him and snarled, growling deep in her throat, not allowing anyone to come near her or her daughter, resting limp like a doll in her arms.

“Bring me a blanket. I need to keep her warm. She’s freezing.” Belle wrapped herself tighter around Annie, pulling the blanket up to her daughter’s chin.

“Belle, sweetheart…”

“Bring me a blanket! And don’t you dare lie to me, Henry! You promised to save her. You promised.” Belle pressed kisses to Annie’s cool face, to her eyelids, and her forehead, and her white lips. “Daddy will bring us another blanket, darling. He promised to make you alright again. You’ll see, you’ll be alright, don’t you wait and see…”

“Belle…” Jekyll just stood there, just stood there, staring at her, with that face filled with utter horror, with those eyes filled with pain, as if it killed him to just look at her, and Belle closed her eyes, squeezed them shut and started screaming, screaming, and she didn’t stop until the sun came up and the first light of the new day danced through the curtains and illuminated the dead child in her arms.

Annie was gone.


	26. All the tiny Pieces

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Substance Abuse

Belle didn’t know how long she had been lying there after they had taken Annie away from her. Her room was dark and quiet, and her nose had long since adjusted to the smell of her chamber pot, or herself. It might well be she reeked, but she didn’t care for it, and she didn’t let anyone come near her or her room to care for her or her chamber pot. The first time someone tried to enter that room, he made it barely out alive again, and after that, Hopper had kept the maids from trying to attempt what he had failed to do. She hadn’t seen Jekyll after that first terrible night, and maybe that was for the better. Her skin crawled when she thought of him, of the promise he broke, of his betrayal.

There was a timid knock at the door, but Belle ignored it, instead rolling over and away from the door. She growled when it knocked again, loud enough to be heard, but the man at the other side of the door – Hopper, by the scent of him – didn’t go away.

“Mrs. Jekyll”, he murmured, and Belle growled louder, feeling the hair at the back of her skull prickle. “Please.”

“Go away.” Belle’s voice was hoarse, being out of use for who knew how long, but she didn’t care for the broken sound of it. She wished she could just roll to a ball of bones and sinews, gnaw at herself until she was gone and the pain stopped. Wished she could tear her heart out and throw it away.

“Mrs. Jekyll, please. Someone needs to look after little Miss Eliza.”

Hopper opened the door, and Belle growled deeper in her throat. She heard the soft tapping of feet, and then her mattress sunk in a little when the child climbed onto her bed, burying its little hands in the folds of her dress to pull itself up to her.

“Mama, are you sleeping?”, the child asked, and its little voice pierced right through her flesh, reminding her of what she’d lost, what they all had lost. She turned, with a groan, to face the little girl, the round little face with the shiny white fangs and the rosy cheeks, looking so despicably healthy. “Mama, I’m so alone. Annie has gone to sleep, and Hopper says she won’t wake up again. Can’t you make her wake up?”

Belle’s skin crawled, prickled with the longing to kick the little thing off the bed, to make it go away, with its rosy cheeks and its terrible questions, but some part of her held her back and told her that this was her little girl, just as lost and alone and confused as she was, told her she needed to protect it from the world. So, despite the revulsion it caused her, she reached out and pulled the little thing against her chest, cradling it, a little too tight maybe, and pressing her face into the curly shock of hair on the girl’s head.

“No, I can’t make Annie wake up again. She’s gone forever.” Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, hoarse and broken, as if it belonged to someone else, to another person lying in her bed and occupying her body. The thing in her arms trembled, and snuggled closer, and soft whimpering noises reached her ears.

“Where is Papa? And Daddy?”

“I don’t know.” She didn’t know and she didn’t care. Jekyll lost every right to exist when he failed to save her daughter, and Hyde…No, she had no space left for him when her heart shattered and disintegrated into tiny pieces. No patience left for Jekyll and his affliction. Because Hyde was nothing but an affliction, and he had been there just as little as Jekyll to save her daughter. She wondered if the pain in her chest was the same pain she would feel if her lungs were carved out from within, taken from her body and crushed in front of her. The thing in her arms still whimpered, and Belle wished it would just be quiet, quiet, so she could hear the silence and the crunching of her bones, feeling unhinged and screaking with every breath she took.

After a while, the thing in her arms slipped out of her bed again, tapping out of the room, and Belle could not say how much time had gone by when she heard whispering just outside her room, whispering that was as loud as the ocean on a stormy day, deafening, forcing her to haul her torso up and retch, retch, until she got rid of the scratching feeling in her chest that seemed to squeeze her windpipe like a fist.

“She needs to get up”, Hopper whispered at the top of his lungs, and Belle imagined to change into her wolf form and bite off his head, painting her luxurious silken wallpaper with splatters of his blood. “Someone needs to reign him in, before he goes out to kill again, and she’s the only one that can reach him.”

“There’s nothing I can do, nor anything I want to do. She’s hysteric, quite common for womanhood.” Someone else was talking to Hopper, and Belle rummaged around in the dark caverns of her mind, trying to remember whose voice it was she was hearing. She remembered the voice, but his name slipped through her fingers, escaping her like a slippery eel, similar to the thing he was.

“I don’t care. She’s been in there for nearly two weeks now. I don’t care what you do, or what you give her, just do something to get her out of there.”

The door to her room opened again, letting in a narrow streak of light, and someone entered, heavy footfalls, accompanied by the smell of death and festering wounds. She retched again, before she fell back onto the lumps of her pillows. She heard the legs of a chair scrape over the floor, and then the intruder huffed and let himself fall onto the chair.

“Mrs. Jekyll”, he said, and his voice crawled over her skin like cold fingers, the nasal tone threatening to make her retch again. “Do you remember me?”

Cold hands touched her, and paralyzed her, huffing out the last bit of strength she had left to fight his touch when he lifted her arm to feel her pulse at her wrist. Images of Jekyll feeling her pulse at her throat flashed through her mind, and she screwed her eyes shut to drive them away with the dulled light of pain springing from her eyeballs.

“When have you last eaten, Mrs. Jekyll?”

Belle didn’t bother to answer, but she supposed that it must have been a while since her last meal. Her body was hurting all over, so she probably wouldn’t notice the pain of a little hunger anyway.

“Hm, I see. Are you in pain?”

When she didn’t answer, the man placed her arm back on the bed and lifted a heavy leather case onto his lap, snapping it open with a clinking sound that caused a shudder along Belle’s spine.

“Do you remember when you served in my house, after your pet Mr. Hyde beat me up? I was in great deal of pain then. And I’m not saying that you don’t deserve a little suffering, but your butler was very insistent that someone helps you out of your hysteria, so you can take care of the little pest problem you’re having, now that your pet has gone berserk…” The man bent down, bringing his piercing eyes close to her face, and all of a sudden, Belle remembered his name, and recognized the smell of him.

“Whale…”

“Ah, I see, you remember me. Now, I’m going to leave you a remedy for your pain, one that helped myself when nearly every bone in my body was broken, and you’ll see, it will lift your spirits in no time.” He extracted a tray out of his case and placed it on the bed next to Belle, and continued to add some utensils to the tray that were wrapped in thin layers of Chinese paper. Belle watched him as he placed his case on the floor again and started to unwrap first a small box of Chinese lacquer, followed by a little lamp and a long pipe of cloisonné that was wrapped in two parts that he assembled after unwrapping. After screwing something that looked like a colorful cloisonné doorknob to the long stem, he opened the lacquer box and took a dark little pellet out of it, showing it to her by holding it up in front of her face.

“Alright. Take a look, Mrs. Jekyll. You will place these little pills in the small bowl of your pipe and heat it over this lamp. It gives off exactly the right amount of heat to vaporize the medicinal contents of the pill, enabling you to inhale them. It will soothe your nerves and get you out of your hysteria.”

“Couldn’t I just take some drops or pills?” Belle took the pipe from the tray and examined it closely. It was a beautiful piece of work that must have cost a small fortune.

“I often found that the vapors of the drug were more effective and more soothing than taking it in a liquid form or as a pill. It takes effect much faster this way, which can be beneficial.”

Belle placed the pipe back on the tray and looked at Whale. “Why do you even want to help me?”

“Oh, I don’t. But I also don’t want to be victim to your little…monster again, and since you’re apparently the only one able to keep him in check, I was able to be persuaded into offering my assistance.” He bent down and snapped his leather case shut again, leaving the tray and the utensils on her bed. When he straightened again, he looked at her for a long moment, and something almost like pity crept over his face, making him furrow his brows. “I know how hard it is to lose someone. It can make us do despicable things, and it can break us beyond repair. But you have to put yourself together again, and get up and out. You still have a living child, and there’s no say you couldn’t bear another one again. You’re still young, and you’re strong. You will get over it.”

Had Belle been in her right spirit, she might have ripped him to shreds then, but instead she sank back into her pillows and stared at the wall. Whale seemed to wait for an answer, but when she didn’t say anything, he just left, closing the door with a soft click after his exit.

Later that day, it seemed, someone else came, carrying a tray with a teacup and a pot of tea, placing it on her bedside table. Belle didn’t turn around, instead just continued staring at the wall, until the intruder – Hopper – cleared his throat to get her attention.

“Mrs. Jekyll.”

“Go away.”

She heard a faint clink when Hopper took the tray that Whale had left on her bed to set it aside, and she tried to summon her strength to snarl at the butler when the mattress sank in and he sat down on her bed.

“Mrs. Jekyll, it’s been two weeks. Little Miss Eliza needs her mother. And we all need you. But more than anyone, Dr. Jekyll needs you. And Mr. Hyde.”

“He can go to hell.” Belle still didn’t turn, but she didn’t need to look at Hopper to feel his concern radiate in waves from him. It was in the hushed, hoarse tone of his voice, in his breath, and the trembling of his hand when he poured tea into the cup and the teapot clinked against the thin porcelain of the cup.

“He’s already there, Mrs. Jekyll. He needs someone to get him out again.”

Now Belle turned, and slapped the teacup out of Hopper's hand. It crashed against the wall and shattered. “I needed him to keep his promise. Only this one promise. And yet, here I am, and my arms are empty and my child is dead. He can rot in hell, because that is where he belongs.”

It should have told her about Hoppers own despair when he reached out and grasped her arm. He had never touched her, and that he did now, knowing full well the peril this put him in, that should have told her how desperate he was. But all she felt was the rage flaring up and scorching her flesh.

“Do you know that Mr. Hyde spent five days and nights raging in the dungeon before he up and left the house? He hasn’t been seen since, but there have been some disquieting rumors…”

“Let them shoot him.” Her voice didn’t waver, and Hopper pulled back his hand as if he had been burned.

“You don’t mean that. It’s the grief speaking out of you. He lost Annie just as you lost her.”

Belle shot up and grabbed his throat, and Hopper paled when her nails dug into his skin. “Don’t ever say her name again.” Her voice had a wolfish tone to it, and Hopper shook when she let go of him and he scrambled away from her.

“Mrs. Jekyll, please…”

“Get out.”

Finally, Hopper obeyed, glancing at the pipe Dr. Whale had left for her, but he didn’t say another word, leaving her once more to stare at the wall. And for quite some time, the house was quiet. Not quiet like a warm summer’s day in the country, but quiet like the muffled silence of a house that didn’t have its windows opened for a long time, a house that had its curtains drawn shut and muffled every sound, even the tapping of a lonely pair of little feet. But even those fell silent after a while, just like everything fell silent, quiet, as if buried under a heap of down blankets.

The silence was broken by a loud crash from the back of the house. Belle didn’t react, not when the crash was followed by the noise of shattering glass and splintering wood, and the roaring of a monster crashing through doors and making its way towards the front of the house, and not when the door to her bedroom burst open and the monster stumbled inside, closely followed by Hopper. Hyde came to a staggering halt just inside the door, his eyes meeting hers for the length of a heartbeat. Long enough to make her insides heave with revulsion, and long enough for her to realize that she was facing his most base self, an animal, if anything at all.

“Belle”, he rasped out, and Belle turned away again, shut out his pleading eyes, his torn clothes, his ragged appearance. He was at the bed in less than three steps, kneeling on the mattress and grabbing her arms to yank her around again. “You look like a skeleton. When have you last eaten?”

Belle laughed at his question. Of all the things of the world, she hadn’t expected concern coming from him. “Why do you care? Get out…”

Hyde narrowed his eyes, those reptilian irises flickering like candles in a draught, and Belle’s teeth rattled when he shook her like a ragdoll. “Look at me, Belle. Look at me.”

Belle didn’t want to look at him, but something in his voice compelled her to do so, and she lifted a bony hand to trace the skin of his arm through the tears of his sleeve. He hissed when her fingertips crossed a scarred patch of skin, and Belle pressed harder into his marred flesh.

“What are these?” She ripped his sleeve completely apart and bared his arm, to find blue lines crisscrossing his skin, inflamed and swollen.

“Ink. Marks. One for each kill of the last days.”

Belle pulled her hand back and looked away from him. “Go away. I don’t want to see you ever again.”

“Belle…”

“You let my child die, although you promised to save her. So, go away. I’m done with you.”

“That wasn’t me. It was Jekyll. I loved her…” His grip on her arms was painful, crunching her bones, but Belle didn’t have the strength to object, to do something about it…and she didn’t even want to.

“You are Jekyll. So, unless you want to make me another mark on your skin, I suggest you leave now.”

Hyde let go of her, as if her skin burst into flames under his grip, and he backed away from her. “I don’t need you as a mark on my skin…you are a mark on my soul.”

“That would be so poetic if you actually had a soul.” She turned to the wall again, curling into a tight ball of bones and skin.

“Mr. Hyde”, Hopper said, his voice quavering, and Belle heard him gasp when the monster in the room moved, his feet scraping over the floor as he approached the door.

“Where’s Eliza?” Hyde asked, and Belle remembered the other child. She hadn’t seen or heard her for a while now.

“She’s with Miss Lucas.”

“Get her back. Something needs to get _her_ out of this room.” The way Hyde spat out ‘her’ told Belle that he was talking about her, but she didn’t care. She waited for the door to close again before she allowed herself to feel anything, and even then, it was only the physical pain of the bruises he’d left on her arms. She struggled up to sit, rubbing over the bruises, and pressing her fingers deep into the flesh of her arms. The pain was blunt, too weak to drown out the pain inside her, and her eyes fell on the tray that Dr. Whale had left her. It was still sitting on her bedside table, unused, and Belle skidded closer to the edge of her bed and took up the pipe. The first pill Whale had shown her to demonstrate the usage of the utensils was still inside the pipe bowl, and Belle used a match to light the lamp on the tray and heat the pipe over it.

When a strange languidness filled her, after inhaling the vapors of the dark pill, she allowed herself to lean back on her bed and let it take over, and it wrapped the pain in a pleasurable fog and dulled it to something small and petty. And for the first time since Annie was gone, her sleep was dreamless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find the last three chapters here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/23jaktxjxebj2s8/Hydeous.pdf
> 
> This is an edited compilation of both Hydeous and A Hydeous Life, plus the final chapter Forty-Eight to Fifty. I decided against uploading them here.


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